The Conference Report passed the full U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday evening and is expected to pass the Senate later this week. Ross commended Arkansas’s Senators Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor, for their work in the Senate to help secure this funding in the final Conference Report.

“As a member of the Health Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, I am committed to doing everything I can to secure important federal resources for our rural health care providers in the Delta Region,” Ross said. “Securing this funding is a step in the right direction for the Jefferson Regional Medical Center as these resources would allow for the purchase of new technologies and resources to better serve patients in Jefferson County and in Southeast Arkansas.”

Ross said the funds are intended to assist the Jefferson Regional Medical Center’s School of Nursing with state of the art technology and equipment. The appropriation would help fund a new computer lab, simulated mannequins and other teaching aids. These resources would help JRMC to recruit and train quality nursing students which are in critical need at the hospital. 

Upon passage of the Labor, Health and Human Services Conference Report in the Senate, the measure will then be sent to the President which he has threatened to veto.

“It is my hope that the President will understand the critical needs of our health care providers and sign this bill into law because our nation’s health care infrastructure should not be a target of partisan politics,” Ross said. 

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