Hilltop Community Health Center, one of Porter County’s two non-profit clinics serving the uninsured, is expanding into Michigan City in neighboring LaPorte County.

Hilltop was awarded a three-year federal grant for $600,000 a year to open a new health center in Michigan City. The funding is part of the President Bush’s High Poverty Counties Initiative aimed at bringing primary health care services to the uninsured or underinsured. LaPorte County has been designated as a high-poverty county.

The new clinic will be located at 710 Franklin St. and is expected to open on Feb. 2. It will serve up to 6,000 patients in the first three years of operations, providing comprehensive medical, dental and mental health services.

The center will serve people who have difficulty getting health care due to a lack of insurance or inadequate insurance, and who might otherwise allow minor illnesses to become severe or who would use hospital emergency rooms for primary care.

With the announcement of its new clinic in Michigan City, Hilltop also announced that it is changing its name to HealthLinc, Your Community Health Center.

Like the Hilltop clinic in Valparaiso, the new Michigan City clinic will provide medical services without geographical limitations on where patients live. Payments of patients are based on their ability to pay per federal guidelines.

Michigan City has had a health care clinic serving the uninsured, the Open Door Health Center, for more than 18 years. That center will transition its patients to the new Hilltop center.

Porter County’s other non-profit health center that serves the uninsured and underinsured is North Shore Health Care located on U.S. 6 in Portage.

Posted 12/20/2007