Anew primary care free clinic has recently opened in Los Alamitos. A satellite facility of Lestonnac Free Clinic, Orange, the new clinic is temporarily located at 3801 Katella, suite 301 and currently is open 9 am to 5 pm, Monday and Saturday. According to Edward F Gerber, Executive Director, because of the recession, “We had a 70% increase in patients and we’re at capacity at the Orange clinic—I can’t take any more.”
New patients are asked to fill out a form where one of the questions is about insurance. If a person indicates they have insurance, they are directed to go to the providers who are covered by their insurance. Gerber said “We hope that people are honest enough to tell us the truth. This is only for uninsured people, it’s not for people that have Medicare, or MediCal, or any of the other public insurances.”
Gerber indicated the new clinic is seeing about 8 to 10 patients per day. “We have the capacity of 35 to 40 per day.” But until the word gets out, it is slow. He indicated the same pattern happened at the other recently opened clinic in Santa Ana. Within a few weeks of opening, they were seeing a capacity crowd. “In a month and a half time, that clinic is now swamped.”
The operation gets grant funding from the California Wellness Foundation, Kaiser, and Orange County Measure H funds, but most of the costs are donated. Gerber said the doctors donate their services, and Los Alamitos Medical Center has donated the office space—about 5,000 square feet. “We have no rent to pay, they’re paying the electric, and I don’t have doctors to pay.”
He also said all of the equipment to set up the office was donated by a doctor who was retiring.
The donated office space, however, is temporary. Gerber indicated The hospital is planning to do some renovation work on the space, so they could not lease it. The free clinic has use of the space until next June, after which time, a new site will be required.
Gerber sees this expansion as imperative in order to continue treating the county’s uninsured population which has dramatically increased due to continuing job and insurance loss that residents are facing. The clinic’s mission is to ensure there are no closed doors for those seeking primary healthcare in Orange County and for over 30 years Lestonnac Free Clinic has provided free medical and dental services to residents within the county. “There is no county hospital or public primary health care system in Orange County”, explains Gerber. “With the current state of the economy, our role as a free community clinic is vital to the health and well-being of the low income residents of this county.”
Lestonnac Free Clinic was founded in 1979 by Sister Marie Therese and is devoted to providing free comprehensive medical and dental care to the low and no income families within the community.
