JELLICO, Tenn. — After the immediate closure of Jellico Regional Hospital, Remote Area Medical's free pop-up medical clinic is coming to town.
RAM's clinic will be in Jellico from March 23 through March 24 and will provide free dental, vision and medical services. The clinic will only be in town for two days, with Sunday only being a half day, according to RAM.
All services are completely free with no ID required but will be on a first-come, first-served basis.
The Jellico hospital closed on March 9 but had also closed down in 2021 after the city council voted to kick out the operator, Rennova Health. In response to the closing in 2021, hospital employees said the company was routinely late making payroll and allowed hospital supplies to dwindle to dangerous levels.
The city of Jellico once again had to travel at least 30 minutes to the nearest emergency room, causing a great need for a free clinic such as RAM, even for a short period of time.
The nearest emergency rooms to Jellico Regional Hospital are Baptist Health in Kentucky or Lafollette Medical Center, both of which are at least a 30-minute drive from Jellico.
According to RAM, the nonprofit was founded in 1985 by Stan Brock and is a major nonprofit organization whose mission is to prevent pain and alleviate suffering by providing free, quality healthcare to people in need.
"To accomplish this, RAM operates pop-up clinics delivering free, quality dental, vision and medical services to underserved, uninsured and underinsured individuals who do not have access to, or cannot afford, a doctor," RAM said.