A Tuesday morning meeting provided Pike County veterans with more information about the Veterans Administration’s proposed community-based outpatient clinic for McComb.
But some of the answers the veterans sought will have to wait until a contract is awarded for the clinic, which is scheduled to open in 2010.
Questions about exactly when the clinic will open and who will staff it, VA officials said, will depend who is awarded the contract to operate it.
“This will be a contract clinic,” said Frank Tuminello, community-based outpatient coordinator from Jackson. He will be responsible for coordinating the efforts and training to get the clinic in operation.
Approximately 50 veterans attended a meeting about the clinic Tuesday at American Legion Post 14.
The audience of men and women who came to learn about the clinic filled most of the available chairs in the building, with others choosing to stand in the back.
Currently, veterans have to go to Jackson or the VA clinic in Meadville for medical services.
Having a clinic in McComb will make it easier for most area veterans in Pike, Amite and Walthall counties to get medical care.
“I’m all for it,” said Tom Gunther, chairman of the Southwest Mississippi Veterans Clinic Committee and commander of Legion Post 14.
“We’re going to have a clinic in McComb, and that will help veterans in this area, although we may have a few who will continue to go to Jackson ore Meadville. We have 3,000 veterans in Pike County, 1,500 in Walthall County and 1,000 in Amite.”
Tuminello told the veterans that the clinic will be a primary care facility, adding that veterans who need to see a specialist or need special treatments will still have to go to Jackson.
Although no definite opening date was given for the clinic, Tuminello said he would like to see it open by mid-summer 2010.
“The clinic will be open from 8 to 5 Monday through Friday,” Tuminello said. “This is where you’ll go to get your physicals, and your inoculations. If you get sick after the clinic closes or on the weekend, you’ll have to go to (the VA) hospital in Jackson.”
If someone wakes up feeling bad, he said, they can go to the clinic and be assessed by a nurse, he said.
“If the nurse decides that you need to see a doctor, she will ask you to wait and they will try and work you in,” he said. “If your condition is not determined to be an emergency, you’ll have to set an appointment.”
Besides physical care, Tuminello said the clinic will provide a mental health service with a social worker on staff.
He said veterans will also be able to talk with a psychiatrist or psychologist through “Med TV,” a closed-circuit television system that will allow the patient and doctor to see and talk with each other.
The VA hospital staff in Jackson has prepared its scope of work for the clinic and submitted it to officials in Washington, Tuminello said.
Eventually, he said, the Veterans Administration will issue a request for proposals for staffing and operating the clinic.
Whoever gets the contract will determine where the clinic will be in McComb and the size of the staff.
He said veterans who are currently going to Jackson or Meadville can choose to either continue going there for medical assistance or can go the McComb clinic.
Tuminello said veteran will have their records transferred by computer to the McComb clinic.
“They’ll (the records) will be there when you come in,” he said.
