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Family medicine practice to serve East Cooper A new outreach family medicine practice serving the East Cooper area will open Aug. 1. The MUSC Department of Family Medicine will operate the practice within the East Cooper Community Outreach (ECCO) building at 1145 Six Mile Road in Mount Pleasant.   The practice will provide Mount Pleasant residents needing primary care service with easy access to physicians on faculty of MUSC's Family Medicine Department. On Aug. 1, it will begin accepting new patients, including those with Medicaid and Medicare.   “We are pleased to be able to provide this service to the medically underserved East Cooper population,” said William Hueston, M.D., professor and chairman of the Department of Family Medicine. “The ECCO staff and East Cooper Hospital have indicated to us that they are providing service to an increasing number of Medicare recipients who are having difficulty getting access to care in the Mount Pleasant area because practices are not accepting Medicare patients.”   ECCO, a 501(c) (3) charitable organization founded in 1989, provides a  range of services and programs often in partnership with other  organizations and agencies to assist the underserved east of the Cooper and parts of lower Berkeley County. Services include a food pantry, dental clinic, prescription medicine and health screening program, utilities and other financial needs assistance, donated clothing and other need based services.    In addition, beginning in the fall, the Department of Family Medicine plans to operate a student-run free clinic in the evening. It will offer additional care to the underserved patients in the area as well as provide supplementary clinical experience for MUSC students and serve as an example of the service-learning concept that is being incorporated into the MUSC curriculum.     The new practice underscores a history of cooperation between MUSC and ECCO.  Students from the College of Dental Medicine have long assisted volunteer dentists at ECCO’s dental clinic; and the College of Nursing administers for the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) funded Reach 2010, a diabetes program that offers diabetes education classes weekly at ECCO to serve patients east of the Cooper. The Department of Family Medicine and ECCO welcome this new opportunity to build on this collaboration in service to the community.   To schedule an appointment, call 792-3451.     Friday, July 29, 2005 Catalyst Online is published weekly, updated as needed and improved from time to time by the MUSC Office of Public Relations for the faculty, employees and students of the Medical University of South Carolina. Catalyst Online editor, Kim Draughn, can be reached at 792-4107 or by email, catalyst@musc.edu. Editorial copy can be submitted to Catalyst Online and to The Catalyst in print by fax, 792-6723, or by email to petersnd@musc.edu or catalyst@musc.edu. To place an ad in The Catalyst hardcopy, call Community Press at 849-1778.