By Megan Ma

RotaCare volunteers at the El Camino YMCA give medical attention to those who cannot afford health care. Haleh Sheikholeslami, M.D. (left) assists a patient with the help of interpreter Carmel Amable (right). Megan Ma

This month, RotaCare celebrates the 10th anniversary of the day El Camino Hospital offered the non-profit medical clinic a home rent-free in the El Camino YMCA basement. The El Camino Hospital Foundation threw a party in Palo Alto April 6 to honor RotaCare’s history and its volunteers.

The RotaCare free clinic bustles Monday and Wednesday evenings like most other hospital waiting rooms. Children rifle through a box of stuffed animals in one corner or sit pensively beside their weary parents. Volunteer doctors, nurses, pharmacists and interpreters slide past each other rushing against the clock - determined to treat every patient.

Looking back to its humble roots, clinic founders and management can’t help but feel a sense of parental pride in their successful program. Until 2000 it was a makeshift operation at St. Athanasius Church in Mountain View, where volunteers had to dismantle temporary exam rooms at the end of the night and reposition heavy equipment. Clinic manager Barbara Avery calls the current facility the Taj Mahal in comparison.

Those who use the clinics are perhaps more vulnerable to illness than others in the community. Seeing a doctor is just not an option in many cases. Many patients do not speak English as a first language and either do not qualify for health insurance or cannot afford it.

“These are the working poor,” Avery said. “It’s daunting for many people to figure out how to get seen. In some cases, people have to choose between buying groceries for their families or buying the antibiotics they need. Many have not seen a doctor in years.”

Angelica Garza, 22, cannot afford health insurance. Without the RotaCare clinic, she wouldn’t receive her diabetes treatment, she said.

“I have no idea where I’d go without RotaCare. I wouldn’t be able to get my insulin, which is extremely expensive,” Garza said.

Many hands make the wheel turn. Local restaurants donate food for the staff that must work through dinner hours. Los Altos Rotarians pick up and deliver the food. Volunteers and a handful of hired staff members coordinate follow-up care to the hospital and organize medical charts and referral services to outside specialists.

“It’s a true community collaborative. We’re all here to help the most vulnerable members of the community who really can’t afford care,” Avery said.

RotaCare offers a wide range of services, including immunizations, physicals for children, gynecology, specialty care (rheumatology, dermatology, optomology) and chronic-illness management.

Of the 163 volunteers running the clinic, about three-quarters are doctors and nurses who serve in the clinic evenings after a full day in their own practices. Pharmacists, some rounded up from local drugstores, also work in the program. One of the most rewarding aspects of clinic is seeing the space become a kind of melting pot for doctors from across health-care organizations, said Avery.

“Kaiser doctors break bread with El Camino nurses and Stanford specialists,” she said.

Internal medicine doctor Stephen Nichols has volunteered for eight years.

“It’s a very important service for the medically indigent. I think we have an obligation to give back,” he said.

Pediatrician and longtime volunteer Elliot Lepler said the clinic is much more efficient than an emergency room, where many patients might otherwise be referred without RotaCare. As a public entity, the hospital has a debt to the entire community to provide for those who can’t pay, he said. Further, the service provided is a standout compared to what people might receive in an ER, he said.

“Everyone here is in the frame of trying to do the best they can with our resources,” Lepler said.

RotaCare provides care for 1,600 underserved community members annually. Immunization specialists provide more than 6,500 services to nearly 3,600 community members annually.

The clinic is funded entirely by community contributions and donations from the El Camino Hospital Foundation, the Rotary clubs of Mountain View and Los Altos, Peninsula Community Foundation, the Health Trust, Silicon Valley Social Venture Fund and Kaiser Permanente.

For more information or to volunteer, call 988-8200 or visit www.elcaminohospital.org.