News Releases

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DATE: December 29, 2006

For more information, contact Virginia Elliott, Vice President for Programs, 620-662-8586

United Methodist Health Ministry Fund announces over $1 million in health grants

Hutchinson, KS—The United Methodist Health Ministry Fund today is pleased to announce new grants totaling over $1,068,000 for health improvement projects in Kansas. The grants support efforts to increase access to health care, improve oral health, and promote healthy lifestyles through better nutrition and exercise. Throughout 2006, the Health Fund made grants totaling over $3,102,000 to support projects benefiting the health of Kansans.

A grant of $150,000 will go to Inter-Faith Ministries, Wichita. The grant will support development of the Kansas Benefit Bank, a web-based service for low-income Kansans to apply for a variety of government benefits to which they are entitled. With partial support from the Health Fund grant, Inter-Faith Ministries will contract with software developers to make more benefit applications available and help Kansas organizations establish sites to offer the service. Federal tax filing is already available through the Kansas Benefit Bank. Medicaid and HealthWave applications will soon be available. Other applications to be added include food stamps, childcare subsidies, utilities assistance, and voter registration. Through this grant, development of sites to make the Kansas Benefit Bank available in the southwest region of the state will be emphasized. Organizations offering the service will have trained volunteers available to assist with applications.

The Wichita-based Institute of Minority Health, Education, & Research will receive a two-year grant totaling $50,000 to go through the process of becoming accredited with the American Diabetes Association. With accreditation, its diabetes self-management training and medical nutritional therapy services are expected to be reimbursable through Medicare and private insurance. The Institute was established in 2003 with the aim of promoting healthy lifestyles through education and research. The focus over the next two years will be providing an exercise and nutrition educational program for patients to use in controlling diabetes, training others to use the same program, and developing Community Health Workers to provide home-based diabetes education in local communities.

GraceMed Health Clinic of Wichita will receive a grant of $114,300 to expand its dental clinic. A second full-time dentist will be added to the current staff and additional space at the GraceMed 1122 N. Topeka facility is being remodeled to accommodate four additional dental operatories. The Health Fund grant will pay for the cost of remodeling additional space for the expansion. With the expansion, GraceMed Health Clinic is expected to serve approximately 17,600 dental patient visits a year.

With a grant of $9,151, the Sedgwick County Department on Aging plans to start a pilot project that will provide oral health education and free screening services for older adults at senior centers, senior housing, and dining centers. Registered dental hygienists will conduct the free screening events. Annette Graham, Director of the Department on Aging, said oral health is among the top unmet health needs of older adults. “Gum disease, tooth decay, or ill-fitting dentures can really compromise overall health and these conditions are aggravated even more by medical conditions and medications taken by older adults,” she explained. About ten percent of inquiries received by the department each month are regarding oral health needs, according to Graham. “We hope this program will help our older citizens understand that they don’t have to tolerate toothaches, bleeding gums, and clicking dentures,” she added. “There is help available.”

A grant of $35,651 was awarded to the Medical Service Bureau, Wichita, to support administrative expenses in 2007 for the Non-Profit Pharmacy developed with a Health Fund grant in 2002. The Non-Profit Pharmacy makes commonly used generic and select brand name medications available to low-income clients at wholesale costs plus a $5 dispensing fee.

A grant of $25,000 has been awarded to Rural Health Education and Services, University of Kansas Medical Center. The grant will support a needs assessment and feasibility study to determine potential use of services to support rural Kansas communities in recruiting dentists. Rural Health Education Services provides similar services for physician recruitment.

Health Ministries of Newton will be awarded a $100,000 grant to remodel and equip space in its clinic to expand dental services. The expanded dental program—which provides dental care on a sliding fee scale based on income—will be part of a regional program to improve access to dental care in cooperation with PrairieStar Clinic in Hutchinson. More than 1,600 patient visits are expected to be provided in the Newton facility during the first year. Services will initially focus on children and pregnant women.

Oral Health Kansas, a statewide coalition dedicated to improving the oral health of Kansans, will receive two grants totaling $198,600. The grants will help support the operation of Oral Health Kansas over the next two years and the continuation of the Dental Champions Leadership Program. The coalition, headquartered in Topeka, has a membership of more than 130 organizations and individuals.

With a $10,500 grant, Southwestern College plans to pilot a web-based seminar for rural business leaders on the issues of providing health insurance. The Winfield-based college plans to engage human resource directors and office managers of up to 20 rural businesses in an exploration of the responsibilities and options for providing access to health care for employees.

With the help of a $30,000 grant, the Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas in Pittsburg will expand its dental services to include onsite visits to schools and long-term care facilities by a dental hygienist. Services will include dental cleanings and preventive services such as sealants. If it appears treatment may be needed for a dental problem, the hygienist will refer patients to make an appointment with a dentist. The new service will be an extension of the Community Health Center’s dental clinic which has three full-time dentists on staff serving close to 900 patients a month. Clinic services are provided on a sliding fee scale based on income.

A grant of $53,050 will go to the Kansas Head Start Association, Shawnee, to develop and evaluate a health literacy program for parents of young children. The program will be designed to be used by health departments, community health centers, and other agencies serving young children from low-income families. A program with similar goals was used in Kansas Head Start centers with promising results. Parents using the program reported a decrease in the number of emergency room visits and doctor visits for minor illnesses or injuries and a decrease in the number of days children missed school and parents missed work.

A grant of $10,000 will go to Legacy, A Regional Community Foundation, located in Cowley County, to develop and launch a website dedicated to its Tiny Teeth program. Tiny Teeth is an oral health education program aimed at parents of young children and was developed with an earlier Health Fund grant. The program and its early childhood oral health education materials will be available for ordering online through the new website. The website is expected to be launched in late January.

A grant of $266,407 was awarded to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. The grant addresses the need to make the link between the environment and health more visible. The grant will fund the creation of a new position of Environmental Health Director for its first two years. The grant will also upgrade data analysis tools to allow more efficient use of data to identify and evaluate potential links between environmental hazards and health status.

A grant of $3,000 is underwriting expenses for the Community Health Council of Manhattan to host a community meeting on regional oral health issues, particularly the lack of access to dental care for low-income families. The meeting is being planned for early in 2007.

A grant of $7,913 was awarded to Kansas State University to support the full implementation of a website designed to help enable communities in Kansas to obtain tools with evidence-based science to combat youth obesity. The website was launched in October and is aimed at youth workers, parents, and community advocates interested in information and resources on diet, physical activity, obesity, and overweight for Kansas teens. The website address is www.knackonline.org.

The First United Methodist Church, Emporia, has been awarded a $5,000 grant from the Health Fund to help establish a Health Ministry program to serve the congregation and community. Grant funding will be used to provide training and purchase equipment and other health ministry resources. The grant project director is Susan Stone, and the pastor of First UMC Emporia is the Rev. Nancy Gammill.

Under the Health Fund’s Healthy Congregations initiative, start-up grants of up to $5,000 are available to local Kansas United Methodist churches to stimulate the development of comprehensive congregational health and wellness ministries. It is the hope of the Health Fund that these one-time grants, added to local church resources, will mobilize strong volunteer efforts to address many facets of health, healing and wholeness in congregations and communities throughout Kansas.

Based in Hutchinson, the mission of the United Methodist Health Ministry Fund is “Healthy Kansans through cooperative and strategic philanthropy guided by Christian principles.” Its funding comes from an endowment established in 1986 by the Kansas West Conference of the United Methodist Church from a portion of the proceeds from the sale of Wesley Hospital in Wichita. Since the Health Fund’s founding, grants totaling more than $44 million have supported hundreds of health-related projects in Kansas.

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