MARQUETTE, MI-- The Superior Health Foundation in Marquette has awarded almost $375,000 in health-centered grants to various groups around the U.P.
The Foundation made the announcements at its Fall Grants Awards Celebration Wednesday night at the Marquette Holiday Inn. This grant cycle included a project initiative to address substance abuse issues.
The recipients and award amounts are as follows:
The Superior Health Foundation awarded large grants to the following:
- Superior Simulation Center ($2,600): The goal of the Emergency Resuscitation Program is to establish a standardized Emergency Resuscitation Skills program. The program will serve the community of Sault Ste. Marie, but will also provide the emergency resuscitation opportunities for learners in all counties of the Eastern Upper Peninsula. The funding will cover 12 AED Practi-Trainers and Monitors with built-in DVD players.
- Great Lakes Recovery Centers ($6,312): This funding will purchase equipment to enable GLRC to implement a virtual reality-based neuroplasticity program in the residential Substance Use Disorder programs in Marquette County. The program will utilize virtual reality equipment and software with individuals suffering from substance use disorder to promote neuroplasticity or the brain’s ability to “rewire” itself and alter reward systems which are negatively impacted by substance use disorders. They will partner with NeuroTrainer to develop and implement the virtual reality programs.
- NMU Multiple Sclerosis ($7,510): This project examines the efficiency of a SpeedMaker, which is a device designed for muscle and strength training among athletes. In addition, this project will also involve outreach by providing in-service education for therapists in the U.P. SHF provided funding to have graduate and undergraduate students support, cover mileage for the participants to travel from Gwinn to Marquette, help with audio and visual services and project supplies.
- Girls on the Run of the Eastern U.P. ($8,500): Girls on the Run is dedicated to creating a world where every girl knows and activates her limitless potential and is free to boldly pursue her dreams. Their program prevents high risk behavior and substance abuse, and supports building resilience. Funding from SHF will enable this organization to expense its outreach across the region with marketing and donor recruitment activities.
- Teaching Family Homes ($11,000): In this collaborative effort with Great Lakes Recovery Centers and other reginal stakeholders, they will create a program aimed at managing the needs of adolescents impacted by significant psychiatric issues who are in need of step-down services from the psychiatric unit of diversion to programming in lieu of placement in the psychiatric unit. SHF covered the funds of equipment, materials, staff training, and program development.
- Schoolcraft Memorial Hospital ($13,540): This provided for the purchase a Video Glidescope, which provides for a clear view of the airway and vocal cords by use of a lighting and camera technology at SMH in Manistique. The Emergency Department is ultimately responsible for airway management of all types including the pediatric to the difficult airway placement.
- Lake Superior Hospice ($14,550): This funding will enable LSH to upgrade furnishings in its suite to provide greater safety and comfort to participants. These upgrades include functioning wheelchairs, lift chairs that allow the most impaired clients to rise to a standing position, an AED device and first aid kits, carpet tile to replace the soiled and worn carpet, a refrigerator to house client lunches and snacks, and office equipment.
In the area of substance use, the SHF used matching grants of $50,000 from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Foundation, $25,000 from the ME Davenport Foundation and $15,000 from the Western Marquette County Foundation to position itself for more than $283,000 in grant funding to:
- Healthy Youth Coalition of Marinette and Menominee Counties ($6,250): This supports the “LOCK IT DROP IT, STOP IT” campaign through the Healthy Youth Coalition, which is focused on reducing prescription drug abuse in our community. This campaign will provide personal prescription lock boxes, free of charge to Menominee County residents. Educational brochures, magnets that will list all law enforcement agencies with a drug drop box, and individual medication dissolving bags for those cannot travel to a drop site will also be available free of charge through this campaign. SHF will fund 250 lock boxes as a pilot project.
- MSU-CHM Upper Peninsula Region ($11,500): A collaboration with UP Health Departments and the network of Upper Great Lakes Family Health Centers, MSU-CHM UP Region will sponsor an American Society of Addiction Medicine Buprenorphine Waver Education Program with a regional conference on how providers can start a Medication Assisted Treatment Program in their own cities. The idea is to create a community of providers across the UP who ca pool their ideas and experience to address the opioid epidemic together. SHF will fund the entire project.
- Catholic Social Services of the Upper Peninsula ($47,500): This grant will enable the Re-Entry Recovery House, a faith-based program with a proven track record of success in working with men in drug recovery, to purchase the necessary equipment and furnishings it needs to operate in Escanaba.
- NorthCare Network ($100,000): In collaboration with Dial Help and Communities That Care, NorthCare’s project will implement the evidence-based Tri Ethnic Readiness Survey UP-wide to mobilize proper community response to substance used disorders, develop/provide messaging/education campaigns to raise awareness of substance use disorders based on the results of the survey, provide funds to evidence-based Communities That Care coalitions, increase evidence-based Guiding Choices providers by bringing a GGC trainer to the U.P. and expand Dial Help’s existing UP-wide Safety Net Program to provide systems navigation, services connection, and post-treatment follow-up to individuals seeking treatment for substance use disorders.
- Great Lakes Recovery Centers ($118,055.10): This proactive grant will help tackle the opioid use problem in three tiers. The first tier of the program consists of a dedicated opioid use service navigation team to assist individual across the U.P. in locating and enrolling in services near them. Tier two of the program is to establish Medication Assisted Treatment services in the Eastern and Western parts of the Upper Peninsula to maximize accessibility to these services. Tier three is the development of in-home care teams which provide post-treatment services. SHF fully funded the last two tiers.
The SHF will accept applications for its Spring 2018 grants cycle in mid-December, with a deadline set for Jan. 15, 2018.
For more information on the Superior Health Foundation, visit its website at www.superiorhealthfoundation.org or call 906-225-6914.
