Ballad Health launches program providing care for mothers suffering from addiction | WJHL


Ballad Health launches program providing care for mothers suffering from addiction | WJHL

GREENEVILLE, Tenn. (WJHL) A multi-million dollar grant from the Tennessee Department of Human Services is allowing Ballad Health to launch a new program.

It is dedicated to addiction-treatment for women who are pregnant and mothers with young children.

News Channel 11’s Pheben Kassahun explains how this will happen at the former Greeneville Community Hospital West Campus, where emergency department and inpatient services were closed last year.

Ballad Health is hoping to improve lives with this new program by providing care to mothers and pregnant women who suffer from addiction.

The health system will provide health improvement care through a program called “Strong Futures”, at Greeneville Community Hospital West Campus.

“We have more than 8,000 children in the state of Tennessee and more in Virginia who have been removed from their families and are currently residing in state care,” Ballad Health CEO Alan Levine said in a press conference Thursday afternoon. “We have, only in our region, about a 36% rate of third graders who are reading at grade level by the third grade and we have far too many children that hit the age of five that are not ready for kindergarten. The common thread underneath all of this the scourge and the pain addiction.”

Ballad Health CEO Alan Levine said the program is designed to be a holistic type of care for not just mothers but the entire family involved.

“We know that recovery looks different for every person,” Ballad Health Behavioral Health Services CEO Tammy Albright said. “This allows each experience to be tailored for that individual woman’s needs and really enables them to bring a strong future closer for both the mother and the children.”

This was made possible through a $7 million grant from the Tennessee Department of Human Services.

“This is a life-changing continuum to self-sufficiency,” Ballad Health Addiction Services Senior Director, Dr. Michael Bermes said. “When a family comes and whatever that looks like then it comes in and we assign them that team. That team stays with them from day 1 to potentially up to 24 months.”

Women enrolled will also gain access to things like credit, job training and placement. The goal is to change the trajectory of their child’s future.

“There’s no factor that leads to poverty more than the hopelessness that comes from addiction,” Levine added.

The Ballad Health Strong Futures Program is set to begin March 1. The health system will begin taking applications in February.


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