Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program Wins National Grant From McCormick Foundation and Major League Baseball to Expand Services for Wounded Veterans and Families

BOSTON, July 8, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- At a special on-field ceremony before the Red Sox vs. Baltimore Orioles game at Fenway Park, officials from the Boston Red Sox, Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital celebrated a $1.1 million national grant from the McCormick Foundation and Major League Baseball. The competitive grant to the Red Sox Foundation will be used to support the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program to expand access to care for veterans with traumatic brain injury (TBI) or combat stress and support services for their families.  

The award from the Chicago-based Robert R. McCormick Foundation and Major League Baseball comes through their joint "Welcome Back Veterans" initiative. The two-year grant will enable the Home Base Program to offer high quality, more accessible care to hundreds of veterans who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to their families, throughout New England.  

"We are proud to support the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program in helping veterans and their families deal with some of the most challenging, though often invisible, wounds of war," said David Hiller, President and CEO of the Robert R. McCormick Foundation. "The program combines veteran-to-veteran outreach, clinical care and social support for both veterans and their families in a very promising model that we hope may be extended to other regions of our country." 

On the field for the presentation of a giant check was McCormick Foundation Senior Vice President Donald Cooke and Red Sox Chairman Tom Werner, who jumpstarted the Home Base Program following a visit with wounded warriors at Walter Reed Army Medical Center along with Massachusetts General Hospital President Peter Slavin, MD, Red Sox Foundation and Mass. General Hospital Home Base Program Director John Parrish, MD and Red Sox Foundation Executive Director and Red Sox Sr. VP Meg Vaillancourt.

"This generous grant from the McCormick Foundation and Major League Baseball through 'Welcome Back Veterans' will enable the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program to significantly expand the clinical services we can offer our veterans as well as the support services we provide veterans families throughout Red Sox Nation," said Red Sox Chairman Tom Werner. "We are honored that 'Welcome Back Veterans' considered our new program a model worthy of expansion and hope that more of the brave men and women who have served all of us will soon be able to avail themselves of the confidential services provided by our Home Base Program."

Launched in September 2009, the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base has served a combined total of approximately 450 veterans and family members, most of whom are residents of the Greater Boston area.

Part of the McCormick/MLB Welcome Back Veterans grant will be dedicated to setting up a Telemedicine component of the Home Base Program to expand outreach to veterans beyond Greater Boston. The Telemedicine Center will be staffed by a Home Base social worker so that after a veteran or family member has registered and been evaluated by Home Base medical professionals at Mass General, the veteran or family member may be able to start to receive their ongoing care via appointments and consultations at the remote telemedicine location.

Following a pilot phase, the Home Base Program hopes to offer patients the ability to connect with their Mass General clinician from their own home, thereby expanding more convenient easy access to care for more veterans. The funding will also allow the medical professionals working with the Red Sox Foundation and Mass General Hospital Home Base Program to explore and study a range of telemedicine alternatives.

"Home Base is committed to breaking down barriers to care, like geography, for veterans and their families.  For veterans with combat stress or traumatic brain injury, getting to Boston can compound their stress. This generous grant will help remove one obstacle standing in the way of veterans and families getting the care they have earned and desperately need," said John Parrish, MD, Director of Home Base.

"Major League Baseball recognizes that our men and women in the military make significant sacrifices in serving our nation every day," said Baseball Commissioner Allan H. (Bud) Selig. "We are honored to work show our gratitude by committing resources to organizations that provide veterans and their family members services to treat symptoms of PTSD and TBI."

About the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program.   The Home Base Program provides: clinical care to New England veterans with combat stress or traumatic brain injury (TBI); counseling to family members; community education for clinicians, caregivers, and community members; and research in the understanding and treatment of PTSD and TBI. The Home Base Program is funded through a philanthropic partnership between the Red Sox Foundation, the official 501c3 team charity of the Boston Red Sox, and Massachusetts General Hospital. Through this new grant, the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program is now generously supported in part by Welcome Back Veterans, an initiative of the McCormick Foundation and Major League Baseball.  

To learn more, please visit www.homebaseprogram.org. More information about the Red Sox Foundation is available at  www.redsoxfoundation.org. More information about Massachusetts General Hospital is available at www.massgeneral.org

SOURCE Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program