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Current Volunteer Opportunities
Article: Bring Meaning Back to Your Life - Volunteer!
Healing Hands Ministries Clinic needs Physician Volunteers
A new charity medical clinic in the Lake Highlands area of Dallas is at about 50% capacity, but would love to be running at 100%. To do this, it needs more physician volunteers. The clinic just added a monthly GYN clinic, so needs GYNs as well.Healing Hands Ministries was formed in January by a group of community leaders that saw the lack of charity medical & dental services in the Lake Highlands area. Sixty percent of Lake Highlands students receive free & reduced lunch, which is a key poverty indicator. Target clients are children, adolescents & adults who are uninsured or under insured and who live in poverty as defined by the federal government.
If you are looking for an opportunity to make a difference in the community and in the lives of grateful patients, contact Janna Gardner at 214-213-0009 or jannagardner@hhmtx.org. The clinic is at 7475 Skillman, Suite 103B, 75231.
Agape Clinic needs an RN Saturday Coordinator
Agape Clinic at Grace United Methodist Church, 4105 Junius @ Haskell, has an opening for a Saturday coordinator (5-6 hours/week). We hope to find an RN, will consider someone with office management and problem-solving skills.Job description:
Qualifications:
RN preferred. Strong social work or related work with healthcare experience considered.
Responsibilities
- Overall: Coordinate the flow of patients, staff, and volunteers on Saturdays (clinic is open from 8 a.m to noon, although closing at 1 p.m. is common).
- Assist physicians, nurses, and other volunteers with finding medications and supplies, and meeting other needs to ensure that they have a positive experience in the clinic.
- Assist vaccination volunteers with set-up and other needs to ensure that they have a positive experience in the clinic.
- Assist the lead promotora to assist promotoras with triage and assignment of patients to rooms.
- Ensure that patient data is accurately recorded on sign-in sheets.
- Assist promotoras with closing the clinic.
- Schedule volunteers as needed. This includes calling physicians and nurse practitioners to request or confirm volunteer assistance to the clinic and contacting potential Saturday volunteers.
- Write and email a brief weekly report on Saturday clinic activities.
Email Charles Kemp at volunteer@agapeclinic.org. http://www.agapeclinic.org
The StewPot Clinic needs Physicians
The StewPot Clinic, 408 Park Avenue, Dallas, meets from 9:00 am to 1:00 pm on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday each week. They see on average 15 to 20 patients a day. All their staff are volunteers. They are looking to recruit two to three physicians to help care for the homeless street people they see. For more information, please contact Dr. ElginWare, at 214 497-4601 or Karen Ware at 214 923 6702.
Faith Memorial Church
A faith-based charity medical clinic recently has opened in South Dallas. Faith Memorial Church, at 1600 S. Ewing, opens its clinic for three evenings a month. The church also is a training site for Katrina survivors through the Texas Work Force Commission and sees many Katrina evacuees in the clinic. The church has the capacity to expand its clinic hours, but it desperately needs volunteer physicians. The clinic also needs donated sample medications and exam tables. Dana Bleakney, MD, is the medical director of the clinic. If you can volunteer your time or medical supplies, contact JR Newton at 214-476-7410.
North Dallas Shared Ministries
An all-volunteer charity medical clinic needs primary care physicians and pediatricians who can volunteer two evenings a month. The clinic is part of North Dallas Shared Ministries and has been in operation for six years. It is in northwest Dallas at 2875 Merrell Road, 75229. Clinic hours are on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6-8:30 p.m. The scope of service is for acute minor illnesses; however, patients may be seen who have chronic needs. In that case, they are referred to other clinics for further care. NDSM provides medical malpractice for the hours you serve. If interested or for more information, contact Nancy Volk at 972-620-8696, ext 226 or 214-616-7959.
Do you ever see patients who have no insurance and pay cash for their visit? They finally got worried enough (or sick enough) that they simply had to see a doctor. These patients are the working poor of our community who usually don’t have health insurance because their employers don’t offer it, or, if it is offered, they can’t afford to buy it. They need every dollar they earn just to pay rent and buy groceries.
If you’re like most physicians, out of the goodness of your heart, you see these patients for free. However, you’ve probably discovered that unless you have the resources you need to care for the patient, such as diagnostic services, medications, specialty care, and hospital care, you can’t provide all the care the patient needs.
Since 2001, the Dallas County Medical Society has been developing a program that will make your volunteer work easier. Imagine seeing an uninsured patient and being able to prescribe the appropriate medications, order laboratory or radiology tests, refer to a specialist, or access hospital services. Imagine this being coordinated by someone other than your office staff. Imagine improved community health care for all. When you’re a Project Access Dallas volunteer physician, this becomes reality.
Project Access Dallas is a network of physicians, partnering hospitals, charity medical clinics, and ancillary partners who volunteer to see working poor patients whose income doesn’t exceed 200% of the federal poverty level, are without medical insurance, and are not on Medicaid, Medicare, or Parkland HealthPlus.
Physicians, hospitals, or ancillary partners who volunteer in the program determine their level of participation by agreeing to see a set number of patients per year. Project Access Dallas staff track their pledges through a database, ensuring that a physician or other PAD partners receive only the number of patients they agreed to see. Because of the generous donated services of our partners, PAD patients are assigned a primary care physician; receive $750 a year in pharmacy benefits; and have access to free specialty care, labs, ancillary procedures, care coordination, and inpatient hospital care.
If you are unable to see patients in your office, Project Access Dallas offers specialty clinic nights at one of our partnering charity medical clinics on an as needed basis. We make it easy for you---all you need to do is show up at the charity medical clinic and see the patients we’ve scheduled. If you require blood work or ancillary procedures completed before you can see the patient, just let us know and we’ll take care of everything, so that when you arrive to volunteer at the clinic, you’ll have everything you need to provide a consultation to the patient.
Project Access Dallas provides compassionate care for our community’s uninsured. We hope you’ll join us as we reach out to our neighbors in need. Please print THIS FORM, fill it out and fax to 214-946-5805. A Project Access Dallas team member will contact you. If you need additional information, please contact Connie Webster, DCMS director of community service, at 214-413-1426, or connie@dallas-cms.org. Thank you for considering this worthwhile project!
Bring Meaning Back to Your Life - Volunteer!
by Connie Webster,
DCMS director of community serviceDo you ever think that your life is monotonous? I'm not talking about a lack of things to do every day, but about getting weary of spending your day doing the same endless tasks that come with being a physician, a parent, an employee, an employer. Do you find that each day passes like a whirlwind, ending when you collapse in bed at night, asking yourself if you'll have the strength to make it through another day?
Sometimes it's not the job or daily activities that makes you feel that life is passing you by, but it's the concern of whether you have touched the life of a person who is in need and whether you have made a positive impact in his life. Volunteering is a sure way to help you refocus and see what truly matters in life.
For the last few years, the Dallas County Medical Society has been receiving an increasing number of calls from physicians interested in volunteering their time and talent. Although many people wonder how a physician has time to volunteer after putting in a full day seeing patients, our members say that the time spent volunteering is worthwhile and brings meaning back into their lives as physicians. Physicians know all too well that their calling can get lost in the hassles of the daily practice of medicine, and that volunteering is a great way to rekindle the passion for their profession.
In 1999, the DCMS Community Service Committee created a networking group of charity health clinics to provide DCMS members the opportunity to volunteer in the clinics and for DCMS to serve as a resource to the clinics. The group, now called the Greater Dallas/Fort Worth Association of Charitable Clinic, has become more than just a networking group—it has enabled DCMS to better understand the challenges of caring for the uninsured and to work toward a solution to a nationwide problem. With the help of DCMS, group members have pooled their strength and resources, and have become one voice for the low-income uninsured population. The group uses its convening power to represent clinic patients and volunteer physicians on legislative issues. DCMS is proud to have been part of this group from its inception and to have helped in its development. Through partnerships such as these, DCMS physicians make a difference in the lives of so many patients.
Perhaps you want to bring back meaning to your life and make a real impact in someone's life who is in desperate need of medical attention. To receive a copy of the DCMS Community Service brochure, which lists these clinics and other volunteer opportunities, contact Connie Webster, DCMS director of community service, at 214-948-3622, ext. 226, or connie@dallas-cms.org.
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