By DEBORAH GERTZ HUSAR

Herald-Whig Staff Writer

CARTHAGE, Ill. -- It's standing room only in the waiting room on most days at the Hancock County Health Department, but people seeking dental care soon will have a waiting area all their own as part of a $545,000 expansion project.

Four treatment rooms, a larger sterile room, a separate entrance and a waiting room are under construction adjacent to the health department in Carthage and slated to open the first of the year.

Health Department Administrator Teresa Beeler said a $300,000 grant -- from the Illinois Children's Health Foundation and targeting expanded dental service to children in rural areas -- covers about two-thirds of the project cost.

The new facility will replace three health department offices remodeled to house the clinic when it opened in 2006. Officials then knew there was a need for dental care but questioned whether the county could sustain the service.

"Two years later, we seem to be able to do that," Beeler said.

The clinic's full-time dentist sees about 3,500 clients from at least 10 counties in Illinois and Iowa with no decline in those interested in service. "We needed to expand," Beeler said.

The county was awarded the grant in January, moved forward with architectural drawings and broke ground in the middle of July. Weather, particularly rain, has been an issue during construction.

The clinic will close for moving in mid-December.

"We'll open in the new site first of the year. That's our target," Beeler said. "Once we get over there, the plan is to look at current staff and make any adjustments at that time."

Some dental clinics accept only patients from one county, but "we accept anybody," Beeler said. "We're not strictly Medicaid. We don't take any other insurance beyond Medicaid, but we have some private pay with a sliding scale based on income."

The clinic recently was approved as an Iowa Public Aid site, effective in January. "We get a lot (of patients) from just across the river," Beeler said. "They end up on the sliding fee scale."

-- dhusar@whig.com/221-3379