A new burn center has opened in Rankin County after Mississippi went nearly two years without any such treatment facility in the state.
Rankin Medical Center's outpatient burn center opened Friday and took on 14 patients from three states, including Alabama.
Hospital officials say the privately funded facility will reduce the need for patients to travel to the nation's largest burn center, which is in Georgia.
The Mississippi Firefighters Memorial Burn Center in Greenville, which was at the time the state's only burn unit, shut down in 2005 over a lack of funding.
While the state still has no inpatient burn unit, advocates say the facility in Rankin County will help.
Doctors from the Augusta, Ga.-based Joseph M. Still Burn Center will visit the Rankin facility two days each month to provide outpatient care to patients from Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama.
Previously, patients had to make the six-hour trip to Georgia to receive any treatment.