News Home

By: JIM MCNALLY | Statesville Record & Landmark 
Published: August 30, 2011.

 Rep. Virginia Foxx was in South Statesville on Tuesday afternoon to take a tour of a medical center and a dental facility whose patients are mostly low-income and uninsured.

Foxx, whose 5th District takes in about two-thirds of Iredell County including most of Statesville, said she was impressed by what she saw at Statesville Family Medicine and Open Door Dentistry.

“They are two very fine facilities,” Foxx said. “And it’s clear they are meeting a very important service in the community.”

Statesville Family Medicine, a kind of one-stop shopping operation located on Shelton Avenue, provides a number of services, according to Veronica Feduniec, the facility’s office manager. 

“We operate under a philosophy of a full continuum of care,” Feduniec said, and explained that patients can be treated at Family Medicine for anything from the common cold and other basic needs to mental health issues to specialized medical matters such as those requiring the services of an OB/GYN. The facility also has an on-site pharmacy.

Toni Overcash was being treated at the Family Medicine on Tuesday. She has been a patient at Family Medicine since 1998, when it was located on Wilmington Avenue not far from the Fifth Street Ministries shelter.

“They’re really good here,” Overcash said to Foxx. “And a lot of us wouldn’t know what to do if they didn’t have this place.”

Feduniec said Family Medicine sees an average of about 900 patients per month and that 85 percent of them are uninsured.

The facility operates on a sliding scale which, for those with the means to pay, can be as low as $20 per visit but only about 40 percent of the patients make payments. 

“We do need facilities like this for people who are uninsured or under-insured,” Foxx said.

Open Door Dentistry is located on the same campus at Fifth Street Ministries. Dr. Deyon McCalla is the facility’s staff dentist. She told Foxx that the services at Open Door “are as good as you’ll find at any dental office.”

Foxx told McCalla that she has a special fondness for dentists and recognizes the importance of early-and-often visits to the dentist.

“As someone who grew up poor and received very poor dental work, I’m very big on getting people into the dentist early,” Foxx said. “I ended up losing a lot of my teeth simply because it was cheaper to pull them than to fill them.”

McCalla shook her head in agreement. 

“I know what you mean,” she said. “That’s what happened to my father.”

But she wants to make sure it happens to as few other low-income children as possible. Much of the small facility is adorned with cartoon posters and other things attractive to youngsters.

Statesville Family Medicine and Open Door Dentistry are both under the directorship of Gastonia-basedGaston Family Health Services, Inc., but under the guidance of a local board of directors. Much of the funding for both facilities comes from federal grants, with the remainder from local donations.

Foxx will be in the area to kick off the Iredell County Agricultural Fair next week before getting to work on what she said will be “a very busy fall” on Capitol Hill.

Statesville Family Medicine: (704) 838-1234

Open Door Dentistry: (704) 838-1108