WORCESTER, Mass. – The South Middlesex Opportunity Council and UMass Memorial Health are collaborating to provide essential services for people experiencing homelessness with the new seven-bed medical respite center.

SMOC said the medical respite program is for individuals coming out of the hospital who have are recovered enough where they'd usually then receive in-home services, but because they're experiencing homelessness, they're not able to do so.

The seven-bed medical respite offers a site for needed care and services.

UMass and SMOC are the main partners. Coastal ambulance employs the EMTs who are onsite 24/7. SMOC said physicians come in regularly and make themselves availble to contact if they are needed.

The program is made possible through a medical respite pilot program created by the state's Executive Office of Health and Human Services, which awarded $5.2 million in grants for partnerships between health care agencies and community-based organizations. MassHealth will take over funding the program after one year.

The state aims to reduce health care costs and improve health outcomes by reducing hospital inpatient lengths through the respite program.

"Most of our patients who come here have had elongated hospital stays," social worker Max Sharkey said. "And most of the time, not all the time, but a lot of the time, if we had a bed available right away or they had the right place to go, they wouldn't need to stay in the hospital. So most of our patients are in the hospital past beyond when they're medically cleared because there's just nowhere medically appropriate for them to go."

"I think that because it's such a small program, there's a sense of community that's developed between the individuals that stay in the respite program," SMOC Chief of Staff Tania Diduca said. "They really get to know each other and they support each other. They have shared space, so they're often really they're around each other all of the time. But it really has created a a comfortable community and a place where I think people feel safe and very supported."

Diduca said SMOC is interested in expanding the seven-bed program, but added space is always the is the number one factor, along with funding.

One of the goals after guests have recovered is to transition them into appropriate and permanent housing. SMOC said they placed their first individual in housing within the last month, and two others are ready to go into housing in the next few weeks.