The target population for the ANCHOR project is the rural communities of Anderson and Cherokee Counties. Anderson and Cherokee Counties, two of the 23 counties in the far northeastern area also known as the Health and Human Services’ Region 4 (R4), are made up of 22 zip codes spanning 16 completely rural municipalities (incorporated cities, towns & census designated places). R4 is characterized by its higher-than-state-average rural nature, with 64% of the population living in U.S. Census-defined rural areas.
The primary service areas for the proposed ANCHOR project are all the 16 completely rural and medically underserved municipalities of Anderson and Cherokee Counties, herein denoted as ACC, with Palestine, Jacksonville and Rusk as the largest cities. Even with gross under reporting, the community reports on average (2016-2019) an opioid prescribing rate of 36.4% and drug overdose mortality rate of 16.5 deaths per 100K population, a rate higher than the State of Texas at 14.5 and ranks among the worst in Texas Counties in overall health status (201/243) and health factors (208/243).
Project ANCHOR is supported by funding from the Health Resources and Service Administration’s (HRSA) Rural Community Opioid Response Program (RCORP) implementation II. This project will empower the community to utilize evidence-based practices and guidelines to reduce demand for and access to opioid and other illicit drugs/substances in the community and mitigate harmful consequences and downstream health effects of opioid/substance misuse such as drug overdose premature death.