FERRIDAY, La. &045; A Sicily Island clinic that will primarily serve low-income and uninsured patients should open later this month, Riverland Medical Center Administrator Vernon Stevens said Saturday.

&uot;I’m hoping it will be open in a couple of weeks,&uot; Stevens said. &uot;We’re in the process of trying to get Š a doctor transferred in to get it open.&uot;

The clinic, a satellite of a clinic in Sicily Island, will be located in Suite 6 of Huntington Plaza adjacent to Riverland. Stevens said plans are to have a doctor from the Sicily Island clinic work at the Ferriday location at least twice a week along with a nurse practitioner.

&uot;Everything’s ready; it’s just a matter of getting personnel here to do it,&uot; Stevens said.

Officials with the Sicily Island clinic could not be reached for comment late Friday afternoon.

Officials of hospitals in Sicily Island and Ferriday announced this spring that the Sicily Island Medical Center had been approved for a $666,667 federal grant to establish the Ferriday clinic.

A federally qualified health clinic is a freestanding health clinic providing an array preventive and primary care services for those who otherwise couldn’t afford health care, with fees set up on a sliding scale based on household income.

Those usually include well-child, acute care, perinatal, family planning, emergency and dentistry services. Such clinics sometimes have social workers or mental health professionals. The clinic will probably contract with a local pharmacist to offer drugs at a reduced rate.

In addition to giving locals on limited incomes greater access to health care, the partnership will have advantages for Riverland itself.

For example, lab and X-ray services will be performed through Riverland. The grant will pay for patient transportation, and the clinic’s doctor will probably refer patients to Riverland when necessary.

Preliminary figures also show such a clinic could have an economic impact of $300,000 to $500,000.

In this round of funding, the Louisiana received a total of $3.35 million to create six new FQHC’s throughout the state. For example, Tensas Parish Community Health Center received $400,000 in the spring to open a clinic in St. Joseph.