The student-run clinic is thought to be the only one of its kind in the
country.
The clinic, founded in 1994 by two medical students who began taking blood
pressure readings once a week at Martha’s Homeless Shelter in Temple, now
has its own building.
Julie Kappler, Lisa Allen, Nicole Rosales and Lee-Lee Nguyen pose for
the camera between patient visits.
(Temple)—Students from the Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine have received a $14,000 matching grant from The Rotary Foundation and the Rotary clubs in Temple and Monterrey, Mexico, to purchase new equipment and improve the level of care at Martha’s Clinic.
Founded in 1994 by two College of Medicine students, Martha's Clinic is a student-run free health clinic for the homeless and indigent population of Temple and surrounding Bell County.
The clinic, which operates solely on grant funding and donations, serves more than 125 people per month and is staffed by volunteer medical students and local community physicians.
As part of the award from the Rotary groups, students plan to purchase a diagnostic EKG machine, external automatic defibrillator and other medical equipment for the clinic.
“The number of uninsured residents of the United States, particularly Texas, and more specifically the community of Temple, is overwhelming,” said fourth-year medical student and Martha’s Clinic co-director Lam Le. “The grant by the Rotary Club will allow us to furnish our examination rooms with much-needed equipment. It will create an immediate impact on the quality of care our students and faculty provide to patients of the clinic.”
Fourth-year medical students can either get one or two weeks of credit for their service at the clinic. Third-year medical students are also welcome to come to the clinic to help out whenever they have time.
Patients are triaged by medical students on a first-come, first-served basis. A medical student performs the entire examination, any necessary minor laboratory work, and formulates a plan of care that is presented to the attending physician.
The medical students are able to dispense oral and injectable medications and perform minor procedures such as sebaceous cyst removal, suturing and callous removal. If necessary, patients are referred to the local Veterans' Affairs Hospital or Scott & White Memorial Hospital.
Patients also can receive help with finding clothing and transportation, signing children up for TEXCare (CHIP), health care education, and help in abuse situations or referral to appropriate social services.
Clinic volunteers are grateful to Rotary for the chance to increase and improve the services they will be able to provide to the people who need them most.
“It is a great honor to receive the grant from Rotary,” Le said. “It validates the service that our students provide through Martha's Clinic. The Rotary Club is definitely a respected organization in Temple. With their lead, we hope other community organizations in Temple will follow and make Martha's Clinic a priority.”
Medical students also received a $20,000 “Caring for Community Award” grant from the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Pfizer Medical Humanities Initiative in May.
The Martha’s Clinic 2006-2007 board members are: Lam Le, Laurel Brown,
Sarah Labuda, Anthony James, April Schiemenz, Ruby Lee and Lee-Lee (Hoa)
Nguyen. Jim Littlejohn serves as the M.D./Ph.D. representative. 