Mo. — CoxHealth received nearly $600,000 in grants that will go to expand services for sexual assault survivors.
The first grant is about $363,000 and was awarded by the Office on Violence Against Women.
The money will be used to add more sexual assault nurse examiners to area hospitals.
It will also be used to establish a sexual assault response team in five counties in the Ozarks.
This team will be made up of law enforcement, health care providers, and crime labs all working to help sexual assault victims navigate all the resources available to them
The second grant is about $227,000 and was awarded by the Missouri Department of Social Services Victims of Crime Act.
One of the projects that money will be used to create a telehealth system for sexual assault victims in rural areas of Southwest Missouri.
It will also provide telehealth equipment and staffing to implement a telehealth nursing hub at CoxHealth in Springfield.
The grant funding will be available in early 2020 and the hospital says these services will launch as early next year as possible.
