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Hearts & Hands Clinic faces growing need
Funding falls during stubbornly tough economic times
Hearts Clinic file Web
In this Herald file photo from 2010, local optometrist Krystal Bragg, right, gives an eye exam as part of services from the Hearts & Hands Clinic. The clinic is in dire needs of funding.
When Jessie Burns first went to The Hearts & Hands Clinic after it opened two years ago, she already knew she had high blood pressure, and she hadn’t been able to afford her medication for some time.She didn’t know, however, that she also had Type 2 diabetes, until she was diagnosed by volunteers working at the free clinic.“I was like a ticking time bomb, taking one day at a time and not knowing what would happen,” said Burns, of Statesboro. “When you go to the doctor, if you don’t have health insurance, that’s the end of the conversation, and the price is extremely high.”Burns didn’t have health insurance because, while her employer offers it, she can’t afford to pay for it. And she was the breadwinner after her husband, who also is a Hearts & Hands patient, lost his job.“There’s no color, race or religion barrier,” she said of the clinic.
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