KENTUCKY’S
KING
board reductions in the risk factors for heart disease.
Along with the exercise tips and
self-sufficiency lessons, the class
instructors passed on referrals
to places like the Hope Clinic in
Danville, where low-income and
no-income residents could get free
health care. Hope receives only
enough funding to operate parttime during the week and has just
three rooms, including one with a
recliner for patients with mobility
issues or those who are so obese
that they can’t lift themselves up
onto the examination table.
Late February brought two
new patients who had gone without health care for years, recalls
Terry Casey, a nurse practitioner at Hope. Both had strokelevel blood pressures. Casey says
she obtained medications right
away from a local pharmacy and
promptly sent off lab work, but
their conditions were already
grave. Within two weeks, one had
suffered a stroke while the other
had a heart attack.
Casey, whose clinic receives no
federal funding, thinks the heart
health classes are a small BandAid for a much larger problem.
And she was surprised that McConnell had anything to do with
HUFFINGTON
08.11.13
them. “Every day I see people who
come through here that are in such
terrible shape without resources
that, from my perspective, what I
see is people like McConnell workin rv