Remote Area Medical looks to schedule more clinics to focus on 'distressed corridor' of Appalachia

More help could be coming for Appalachian Kentuckians who need health care. Remote Area Medical is launching a two-year campaign beginning in September called "Stop the Suffering in Appalachia," designed to work with community organizations, health-care professionals and volunteers in Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio and Mississippi to raise funds to provide free care to as many people in the "distressed corridor" as possible, according to the group's website. RAM lists 15 percent of the Appalachian population, or 180,000 people, as needing the services. The cost per patient is $22.22. A clinic is scheduled Oct. 25-26 at Rowan County Middle School in Morehead. (Los Angeles Times photo by Genaro Molina: Patients at a clinic in California)

RAM, which has more than 84,000 volunteers, has provided more than $75 million worth of free medical care in more than 700 mobile clinics to 545,000 patients, according to the organization. Despite those staggering numbers, they say they want to reach even more people in need "to establish RAM Affiliates based in Appalachian states to provide ongoing services and healthcare access beyond 2016." (Read more)

The solution is to "work with local organizations and doctors in each state organizing clinics on a local level by donating two trucks to help with health care procedures," Laura Halm reports for WATE-TV in Knoxville. That means, RAM founder Stan Brock told Halm, that when RAM holds the clinic in October in Kentucky, "those people in the middle of Kentucky don't have to drive all the way down to Knoxville or come and find us in some other part of the country." It also means RAM can hold more clinics each year, raising its average total from one or two to five or six. Brock told Halm, "We really need to have an intense focus on Appalachia in our own backyard, because the need is so great." (Read more) For the clinic schedule click here.