(from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) 

On May 4, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell announced more than $260 million in funding to 290 health centers in 45 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico for facility renovation, expansion, or construction. Health centers will use this funding to increase their patient capacity and to provide additional comprehensive primary and preventive health services to medically underserved populations.

In Tennessee, Cherokee Health Systems, Maury Regional Hospital (Lewis County Health Center), Mercy Community Healthcare, Rural Health Services Consortium, and Neighborhood Health were awarded a combined total of more than $4.2 million, to serve a projected 8,140 additional patients.

“Health centers are cornerstones of the communities they serve,” said Secretary Burwell. “Today’s awards will empower health centers to build more capacity and provide needed health care to hundreds of thousands of additional individuals and their families.”

These awards will allow health centers to renovate or acquire new health center clinical space to help provide care to more than 800,000 new patients nationwide. This investment builds on the nearly $150 million awarded to 160 health centers for construction and/or renovation in September 2015. This funding comes from the Affordable Care Act’s Community Health Center (CHC) Fund, which was extended with bipartisan support in the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) of 2015.

“Providing funding to help health centers renovate their facilities will allow them to provide care to more patients,” said HRSA Acting Associate Administrator Jim Macrae. “Perhaps more importantly, though, health centers will now be able to provide more health services in one location, better meeting the needs of their communities.”

Since the beginning of 2009, health centers have added 6 million patients; they now serve nearly 23 million people each year. Today, nearly 1,400 health centers operate about 9,800 service delivery sites in every U.S. state, D.C., Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the Pacific Basin.

To view a list of the award winners, visit: http://bphc.hrsa.gov/programopportunities/fundingopportunities/hiip/2016awards/