breaks ground on new Earle facility

East Arkansas Family Health Center breaks ground on new Earle facility

Project ‘ right on schedule’ for September opening

news@theeveningtimes.com

East Arkansas Family Health Center broke ground on a new dental clinic that will provide service to residents in Earle for the first time in two decades.

Dr. Susan Ward-Jones said the new clinic will be housed in a new 2,000 square foot addition to their existing building at 216 Arkansas Street and is expected to open in September.

“We are very excited that East Arkansas gets to bring dental care to this community,” Ward-Jones said.

“We’ve already ordered equipment. We’re close to hiring a full-time dentist with a dental assistant, and we are also adding a room for an ophthalmologist who will travel there once a week for vision care.”

East Arkansas Family Health Center provides accessible, affordable, quality health care to under-served communities with large populations of uninsured and low in come residents.

The health care provider received a grant in 2015 to open a sixth location in Earle in addition to its offices in West Memphis, Blytheville, Lepanto, Trumann, and Helena.

“This will be an addition to an already existing satel- lite medical clinic there,” Ward-Jones said. “We opened that site in 2015 to provide medical, lab, and X-ray. When we opened it we were slated to provide dental services by the second year. So we are right on schedule.”

The $600,000 addition is being paid entirely by East Arkansas Family Health Center.

Ward-Jones, who is a resident of Earle, said there is a huge need for dental services in the city and expects the clinic to stay busy.

“This city has not had access to dental care in over 25 years,” Ward-Jones said. “I still go to church there and there isn’t a time that I am in Earle when I don’t get asked when are you going to bring dental services. They ask about it all the time. East Arkansas is committed to providing excellent quality care to areas where it is needed. That is why we were successful in getting funding to open up the medical clinic here. So

we are quite excited.”

By Mark Randall