Note: This story was updated on Sept. 14 to remove information that was incorrect about the Family Medicine Residency program.
The Family Medicine Residency program in Chattanooga, which sponsors seven residents a year at the main Erlanger hospital, is expanding to Bledsoe County.
The University of Tennessee College of Medicine in Chattanooga announced Wednesday it has received a $750,000 federal grant to extend care at the Erlanger Bledsoe Primary Care practice in Pikeville, Tennessee. The U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration is establishing the Family Medicine Rural Track to offer training and extend health care in Bledsoe County, which is one of eight Tennessee counties regarded as "economically distressed" by the Appalachian Regional Commission.
Bledsoe County has half as many primary care doctors per capita as the statewide average in Tennessee and nearly one of every six residents lacks health insurance, according to U.S. News & World Report.
"COVID shut down a lot of our global health and international mission work and put a spotlight on the desperate need in our immediate areas," Dr. Leslie Griffin, chair of the Department of Family Medicine in Chattanooga, said in a statement Wednesday. "It made us look at our neighboring counties and what their primary health care needs were, and it was shocking to see the lack of health care access in some of these areas."
Griffin said a funding opportunity grew out of Erlanger's residency program "and we determined that the best way to serve the areas would be to start a rural training track."
— Compiled by Dave Flessner