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Federal grant to help Sussex County seniors

Delaware Public Media

Home-bound seniors in Sussex County will get more support services thanks to a federal grant.

Health and Human Services gave CHEER Senior Services, La Red Health Center and Educational Health Resources International $750,000 over the next three years.

Those organizations will use the money to expand Meals on Wheels services to include medical monitoring.

Sen. Tom Carper said when volunteers drop off meals for home-bound seniors, they’ll also check to see if they need medical care.

“Do more than just make sure people have some food in the course of a day or a weekend," he said. "And to actually affect in a positive way their health.”

Sen. Tom Carper said the volunteers will get some training to do the wellness checks.

“We’re not going to turn the volunteers into nurses or turn them into doctors, but to make sure they have some preliminary training, some basic training to identify more serious problems that can be addressed early,” he said.

The program will make sure seniors have a medical home and an annual wellness exam through Medicare. Researchers at the University of Delaware will help the organizations compile and monitor the data.

Only seven grant applications in the U.S. were accepted.

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