The Center for Rural Health Innovation
is a relatively new non-profit in Mitchell and Yancey Counties. The overall mission of the organization is to apply innovative technologies to improve access to health care in rural communities. Currently we have two projects under way: the MY Health-e-Schools school-based Telemedicine program; and, the Nurturing Our Own project focused on developing rural heath care providers from our region to help address the overall shortage of health care providers.
Telemedicine Pilot Has Started! MY Health-e-Schools is live in three schools in Mitchell & Yancey Counties in North Carolina
On September 1st, 2011 MY Health-e-Schools school-based telemedicine program began providing care in three schools: Micaville Elementary in Yancey County and Harris & Bowman middle schools in Mitchell County. Enrollment packets went home in every student’s backpack during the third week of school, currently 250 out of 700 possible students are enrolled and we continue to receive 10-15 new enrollees each week.
Last month, Mitchell County Schools’ social workers and counselors learned more about East Tennessee State University’s Southern Appalachian Children’s Telebehavioral Health Clinic.The program focuses on brief interventions and collaborating with local providers to help students with behavioral health issues ranging from grief about a loved one’s death to classroom behavior issues. The services are available immediately to students at Bowman and Harris Middle Schools and we are working to provide them through desktop video conferencing.
As the program continues to grow in enrollment and numbers of encounters, new schools will be added to the network. Hopefully the success of the pilot program will be evident by early in 2012. Current plans are for MY Health-e-Schools to be present in 16 of the 18 schools in Mitchell and Yancey counties in the next 18-24 months.
In the past 6 months the MY Health-e-Schools program has purchased and installed approximately $100,000 worth of videoconferencing hardware on the Mitchell County Schools network. We are working with both districts to help them use this for video conferencing and continuing education for faculty and staff and community organizations.
