When the Rotary Club of San Jose was in search of a brand new location for the RotoCare Bay Area medical clinic, its members decided to supply the services to individuals who need them fairly than bringing them to an inpatient facility.
Five years later, the Rotary Club, in collaboration with Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County and the Order of Malta, opened its mobile Rotary Medical Clinic on October 17 at Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish in downtown San Jose.
The mobile clinic is designed to bring health care on to vulnerable populations, including homeless, low-income families and immigrant communities at multiple locations throughout Santa Clara County. It will provide services reminiscent of health screenings, social services, advantages enrollment, behavioral health and other referrals.
“We wanted to identify a project that we believed would meet an urgent need,” San Jose Rotarian Vincent Sunzeri said on the grand opening ceremony. “We were looking for something that would have long-term impact and inspire a sense of pride and inspiration, and we believe the Rotary Mobile Medical Clinic does just that.”
“So when we deal with the problems of poverty… we have to deal with food and housing, access to social services, access to legal immigration services and access to employment,” Kepferle added.
The mobile clinic is the second joint project between Catholic Charities and the Rotary Club. The first was a mobile emergency vehicle in 2019. Sunzeri said one goal of the mobile clinic is to cut back the variety of medical emergencies amongst vulnerable populations.
“Let’s think about moving from episodic care to trying to transition people into the medical system,” he added. “That will be the true measure of our success.”
Originally published:
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