The funds cover four major categories of spending: workforce recruitment and retention, building new psychiatric emergency services, creating an online health network for hospitals to better communicate, and innovation grants created from public feedback.
Reeves said many of the gaps in healthcare throughout the state are caused by unfilled jobs in hospitals. The grant funding will be used by schools and health centers across the state to prepare locals for those jobs.
“We have Mississippians who want to work in healthcare, and we have communities that need healthcare professionals,” Reeves said. “We’re bringing those two things together by making training more accessible, by helping people advance their careers, and by building a workforce that can serve their own communities for years to come.”
Workforce training programs are expanding in healthcare to reach students as early as middle school.
Courtney Taylor is the director of Accelerate Mississippi and is helping coordinate many of the career training programs. She said one of their targets is reaching teens while they are in middle and high school.
“I think there’s some really cool and creative things that Mississippians are doing,” said Taylor. “We’re really thankful and impressed with the humans doing the work at the local level, who stood up and said ‘we have an idea, and we want to do it.’”
Reeves compared early job training programs to the state’s success in reading benchmarks, and said having more programs like these in schools will help students be more prepared for the workforce.
Three new emergency psychiatric centers are being built to cover northern, central and southern Mississippi.
Reeves explained that the facilities are designed to alleviate strain on the state’s corrections facilities and provide a more appropriate place for Mississippians experiencing a mental health crisis.
The hospitals building the centers are the University of Mississippi Medical Center Greenwood Hospital in Leflore County, Merit Health Central in Hinds County, and Memorial Hospital in Harrison County. Officials say each will be equipped to handle the unique needs in the regions they serve.
The Mississippi Department of Health is using the money to continue development of a Health Information Exchange to connect hospitals and share real-time data with researchers.
State Health Officer Dr. Dan Edney explained that hospitals across the state use various software programs to handle patient information, and many are incompatible with one another. Rural doctors may not have a program at all. He said having a uniform state system will allow every provider in the state to collaborate more easily.
Dr. Edney said it will also give health officials and the legislature better insight into how programs are performing.
“So folks like us at the health department can look at why hospitals are struggling in certain areas of the state. Why we have counties with excess infant mortality despite access being available. Things that we need to know very quickly and not two years later,” Edney said.
Governor Reeves said he wants to hear from Mississippians with ideas about how to continue closing gaps in healthcare and address problems in the system.
Reeves calls it the Innovative Pilot Program aiming to help communities create their own solutions. “Because we know that some of the best ideas for improving healthcare are going to come not necessarily from the people on this stage, but from the people in our communities. From the people who live and work in our small towns.”
Applications are now open and will close on November 23.
