Project Title: “Carter County First Day Forward Project” Requested Award Amount: $1,000,000 Applicant Organization Name: St. Claire HealthCare (on behalf of the Northeast Kentucky Substance Use Response Coalition) Applicant Organization Address: 222 Medical Circle, Morehead, KY 40351 Applicant Organization Facility Type: Nonprofit Rural Hospital Project Director Name / Title: Carla Terry / Director of GME, Grants & Contracts, St. Claire HealthCare Project Director Contact Information: Phone: (606) 783-7586 E-mail: carla.terry@st-claire.org EIN Exception Request: No Current FY20 or FY21 RCORP-Implementation award recipient? Yes (both years, but in different target counties than this FY22 RCORP-Implementation proposal) How applicant first learned about the funding opportunity: FY20 RCORP-Planning HRSA Project Officer Number/List of Consortium Members: 4 members: 1) St. Claire HealthCare/Northeast KY AHEC; 2) Pathways, Inc.; 3) Carter County Detention Center; 4) Grayson Health Park clinic Previous / Current RCORP Award Recipient: FY19 RCORP-Planning Applicant Organization; FY19 RCORP-Planning Consortium Member; FY19 RCORP-MAT Expansion Applicant Organization; FY20 RCORP-Planning Applicant Organization; FY20 RCORP-Implementation Applicant Organization; FY21 RCORP-Implementation Applicant Organization Brief Description of the Target Population: Carter County is located in northeastern Kentucky and has a population of 26,627 (approximately 0.3% of the population is American Indian/Alaska Native). Opioid use disorder is widespread within the proposed service area. According to the University of Chicago’s NORC Appalachian Overdose Mapping Tool, the overdose mortality rate from 2015-2019 for Carter County was 66.1 per 100,000 population. This rate is significantly higher than the Kentucky rate of 48.5, the Appalachian rate of 43.6, and more than double the U.S. rate of 28.7. Perhaps even more notable is the change in the overdose death rate by +26.
5 deaths per 100,000 population in Carter County from the preceding five-year period. As a result of COVID-19 and an increased use of the more deadly fentanyl, the rate as of June 2021 was even greater, at 79 per 100,000! Residents of the service area also experience many economic barriers to accessing all forms of health care, but particularly substance abuse treatment, which is not always covered by health insurance. Kentucky is ranked as the 46th-poorest state in the nation, and the service area has significantly lower per-capita incomes than the state as a whole. The percentage of the service area population with no high school diploma is nearly double both state and national rates. Carter County also has below-average percentages of the population with post-secondary education, which contributes to higher rates of unemployment and underemployment in the service area. Those who abuse opioids generally have lower levels of academic achievement, higher rates of poverty, and a greater likelihood of having an arrest record. This project will target several populations within Carter County who have historically suffered from poorer health outcomes or health disparities, as compared to the rest of the target population. Persons leaving incarceration with SUD/OUD are more likely to experience homelessness as a result of limited recovery housing options and the regulations or constraints that prohibit them for accessing housing; as a result, we will replicate our First Day Forward reentry program in Carter County to engage with inmates and connect them to housing, treatment, recovery resources, employment, and other services post-release. For adolescents and youths, we will expand our school-based prevention programming, which includes “lived experiences” presentations by local peer recovery support specialists. For the elderly, we will target medication safety presentations to local senior citizen centers. Target Service Area: Fully Rural – Carter County, KY Target
Service Area Overlap: No