Why I value volunteering as a doctor: I spend time with the patient, no laptop between us.
A viable remedy to doctors’ and nurses’ sense of burnout and moral injury is right here in the Coachella Valley. We stay involved, caring and doing what initially attracted us to study medicine or nursing.
For 12 years, I have been giving a half-day each week providing good care with minimal paperwork and bureaucracy. No fees, bills, co-pays, deductibles or prior approvals. Sounds impossible? It is not.
As a volunteer provider at one of the nation’s 93 Volunteers in Medicine clinics in Indio – a National Association of Free and Charitable Clinics program – I can do what I was trained to do, what I dreamed of doing when applying to medical school.
We see patients for their primary care needs in Indio and Palm Springs who are uninsured or underinsured, whose income may make them ineligible for MediCal, or who can’t afford their share of the cost of the premiums in their employer-based programs. More than 60% of our patients are employed, mostly in the service industry that keeps our neighborhoods humming: restaurant staff, grocery and retail workers, construction and maintenance people, gardeners and housekeepers. Our services keep Emergency Departments available for true emergencies. We teach about diabetes, preventing heart disease and cancer because we have the time to do so.
“How can that be?” you may wonder. What’s our secret? It’s no secret – we don’t charge for anything!
We spend time with the patient and family, no laptop between us. Our patients cannot access physical therapy, so we demonstrate. With our diabetic patients, we advocate whole fruits not juices, whole grain foods and avoiding high-fructose corn syrup. We discuss getting older, menopause and andropause or prescribe prenatal vitamins before the first obstetrics visit. VIM provides diabetes & heart health educational classes led by talented and committed staff.
Patient stories fill my day and my heart.
The Volunteers in Medicine clinic is also a teaching facility for our local academic medical centers, so doctors and nurses in training provide care in continuity, not an isolated episode in an emergency or on hospital admission. Our “street medicine” team provides basic care where it is most needed. We vaccinate and distribute menstrual products and condoms to all.
Surely there are costs, but not to the patient. We are a nonprofit charitable agency. Riverside County leases us our Indio office for $1.
Paid staff members administer the program. Since our opening, 97 providers and 96 support staff, donated 8,500 hours of time. We have fundraisers and friend-raisers and receive support from local and national foundations and generous individual donors who value what we do. Critics may decry that such services discourage people from buying insurance or paying their way. Keeping our neighbors healthy maintains our communities and local economy. It is a wise investment.
Our volunteers eagerly come to help. Our skills stay fresh. We feel truly useful, giving back to our communities. Using our training is joyful and as well as rewarding. COVID exposed flaws in our health care system, amplifying our colleagues’ dissatisfaction. Volunteerism is a partial antidote.
We can and do change the lives of our patients and ourselves as we get back to our professional roots. Consider some well-spent time at a free and charitable clinic. Join us, please!
Stewart Fleishman, M.D. is a volunteer physician and immediate past board chair at the Coachella Valley Volunteers in Medicine Indio and Palm Springs. He can be reached at stewartbf@aol.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: I'm a doctor who volunteers: I spend time with the patient, no laptop between us.
