The Vanderbilt Comprehensive Care Clinic has received a nearly $40,000 grant for 2013-2014 from the Baptist Healing Trust (BHT) for its Pharmacy Support Program, which provides free or low-cost medications to people with HIV/AIDS.
The clinic was one of 27 local non-profit health service organizations that received grants in the third quarter of 2013 from BHT, a private grant-making foundation established when Nashville’s Baptist Hospital became part of St. Thomas Health Services in 2002.
This is the fourth grant BHT has awarded to the clinic, formerly known as the Comprehensive Care Center (CCC), for its Pharmacy Support Program. One of the nation’s largest outpatient HIV/AIDS treatment facilities, the CCC moved to Vanderbilt One Hundred Oaks in 2010.
In 2012, 177 patients received 523 free or low-cost medications through its Pharmacy Support Program. While the federal Ryan White Program covered many of the health services received by the clinic’s nearly 3,000 patients last year, it does not pay for all the medications they need.
“The Pharmacy Support Program enables patients to receive critically important medications to manage HIV disease and other conditions, including diabetes, heart disease and mental illness,” said the clinic’s chief medical officer, Stephen Raffanti, M.D., MPH, who founded the CCC in 1994.
“We are proud to support the Vanderbilt Comprehensive Care Clinic and their work to create access to quality, compassionate health services for the community’s most vulnerable residents,” said BHT president and chief executive officer Cathy Self, Ph.D.
