{"id":113145,"date":"2015-04-16T20:56:30","date_gmt":"2015-04-17T02:56:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/m-chs-clinic-plans-shown\/"},"modified":"2015-04-16T20:56:30","modified_gmt":"2015-04-17T02:56:30","slug":"m-chs-clinic-plans-shown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/m-chs-clinic-plans-shown\/","title":{"rendered":"M-CHS clinic plans shown"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Ciccia\"
Ciccia<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The new Montezuma-Cortez High School will include a student health clinic, complete with a full-time registered nurse and medical lab.<\/p>\n

Addressing district board members on Tuesday, April 14, plans for the school-based health center were unveiled by Montezuma-Cortez High School health services director Sue Ciccia. The clinic will operate in coordination with Southwest Health Systems, of Cortez.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a clinic for students,\u201d Ciccia said. \u201cThe services are tailored to their needs.\u201d<\/p>\n

During a PowerPoint presentation to the board, Ciccia highlighted the results of a student survey. Among students, the greatest acute medical complaints were reports of headaches and exhaustion, and their top chronic health issues were allergies and asthma.<\/p>\n

Ciccia said there were also a large number of students who revealed they suffered behavioral health issues including stress, depression and anxiety. She added a teacher survey regarding student health needs revealed the same mental and emotional concerns.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe clinic will have full-time social worker,\u201d said Ciccia<\/p>\n

School-based health clinics started popping up in America in the 1970s. Across Colorado, there were 54 similar centers in 2013, which served nearly 30,000 students.<\/p>\n

Ciccia said the benefits of a school-based health center included fewer emergency room visits, improved immunization rates and faster response times to medical needs. She added that the clinic would also reduce student absenteeism.<\/p>\n

\u201cKids stay in school, and parents stay at work,\u201d said Ciccia.<\/p>\n

In addition to high school students, the clinic would also offer comprehensive, preventive and integrated care to other students in the district, which serves some 2,900.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou do not have to be a student at the high school to receive treatment,\u201d said Ciccia.<\/p>\n

The local hospital has secured a $250,000 grant to help launch the school-based health center. Ciccia added the non-profit clinic would neither require additional tax revenue nor added funding from the district to operate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf a child can\u2019t pay, then they will still be seen,\u201d said Ciccia.<\/p>\n

Helping to enhance a parent\u2019s ability to offer their child access to health care, Ciccia said she envisions opening similar clinics at other area schools in the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cHealthy communities start with healthy kids,\u201d she said. \u201cInvesting in children\u2019s health saves everybody money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Officials report that construction on the $33.7 million Montezuma-Cortez High School remains on schedule.<\/p>\n

The new two-story 152,500-square-foot schoolhouse is expected to open this fall.<\/p>\n

tbaker@cortezjournal.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

students, director says<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":113146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[13,209,36,210],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-113145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-hospital-and-clinic","tag-montezuma-cortez-high-school","tag-southwest-health-system"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/113146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113145"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=113145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}