LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The Kentucky Racing Health Services Center is celebrating 20 years of service.
The center provides care to backside workers and their families for a $10 copay. Staff said there are 400 people who live in dorms on the backside during the racing season.
Backside workers take care of more than 1,400 horses. Officials from Kentucky Racing Health Services said health care can be a challenge for backside workers because of financial constraints, language barriers and demanding work schedules.
"Rapidly, we found that the needs were really beyond what we had thought about and that these folks needed primary care," said Whitney Nash, dean of the School of Nursing at the University of Louisville.
She said the center has grown since opening in 2005.
“Over the years, we grew and we were seeing more and more patients, more complex patients," Nash said. "We expanded our hours."
The center is preparing for its busiest season, with Derby 151 right around the corner.
"The patient population is migrant, so over the winter they go south, to the racetrack clinics in the south," said Sarah Robertson, family nurse practitioner. "And then they slowly come back to Kentucky in the weeks coming up to Derby week."
The center is open three days a week and has six nurse practitioners. Services for women's health, family practice and now psychiatric health are offered.
