We recently announced the expansion of Southside Medical Center’s East Point location, which took effect on January 12. Unfortunately, however, some of the initial commentary and news coverage about our announcement downplayed or omitted our role in serving our neighbors.
Our growth is the result of over a year-long partnership with Wellstar to expand our facility and services and to transition urgent care that they have been providing to our team of healthcare providers. Simply put, we provide much more than urgent care, and this transition will enable Southside Medical Center to offer people in East Point and surrounding communities continued access to quality, convenient urgent care in addition to an array of services such as primary care, women’s health, pediatric, dental, mental health services, discounted pharmaceuticals and many others.
Since we started working with Wellstar to coordinate treatment for urgent care patients just over a year ago, the number of people seeking care at the urgent care clinic which is next door to Southside’s clinic dropped almost 65%, from nearly 80 patients per day in October 2022 to 28 patients per day by November 2023. Many of these patients have been connected with a medical home with Southside and now are seeking services in one of our centers instead of using the urgent care. In other words, through this cooperation, we’ve been able to keep many of these people healthier and out of urgent care through personalized primary and preventative care. By arranging for preventative care, we are helping to improve their quality of life and prevent subsequent urgent care or emergency room visits.
The Atlanta and East Point communities have a critical need for preventive and primary healthcare services, especially those focused on treating chronic illnesses and our expansion in partnership with Wellstar is a step forward. Like others, we believe the community should have a hospital. We also understand the challenges of providing healthcare services in communities with higher percentages of people who are uninsured or under-insured compared to communities with greater financial resources.
We applaud the efforts of our elected officials who are working to find ways to bring a hospital back to East Point. We’re doing our part by continuing to cooperate with Wellstar about the future of the site and by developing a new model for acute care that meets the needs of the community.
As a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC), Southside has been providing quality healthcare for the people of East Point and South Fulton, including economically challenged communities, for more than 50 years. Southside Medical Center, Family Health Centers of Georgia and other FQHCs play a critical role providing quality healthcare in East Point, Atlanta and throughout Georgia. Southside alone was 13 locations that reach from Lawrenceville to Butts County.
Our teams of talented, dedicated professionals take great pride in caring for our neighbors by providing quality medical care that they might not otherwise be able to afford. We provide urgent care, primary care, women’s health, pediatrics, immunizations, mental health and other services in an environment of dignity and respect, regardless of a patient’s ability to pay. In addition to accessing a full suite of medical care, patients also can receive pharmaceuticals at a lower cost and free transportation to and from their appointments.
We have several recent success stories that began at our East Point urgent care center. One person with high blood pressure began receiving regular care at one of our Centers and is no longer in and out of the hospital. We helped another person who visited our urgent care for tooth pain get a dental extraction the same week in one of our sites even though other dentists had told her it would be months before she could be seen. And a third person, with diabetes, was able to see our staff podiatrist and is now enjoying life without foot pain.
This is what we mean by establishing a medical home for the people we serve.
Increasing access to primary/preventative care while offering urgent care, regardless of the ability to pay, helps to increase quality of life and decrease unnecessary and costly hospital visits.
This is also why our partnership with Wellstar is so important to the people of East Point, and why we’re excited about the opportunity. It’s a difficult and challenging situation. Collaboration and fresh thinking are critical to our success.
As care providers and a community, we must focus on the opportunities. Wellstar is investing in Southside Medical Center because of our 55-year history of success, enabling us to increase the services we offer and expand the size and capacity of our East Point facility. With their support, we will be able to provide more quality care for more people in need through a model that is sustainable for years to come.
It’s partnerships like this will enable us, as a community, to develop the solutions that we all desire.