DENTAL 26.88%
PHARMACY 48.24%
10.59% VISION
Tim Ball, retired air force pilot, volunteers 40 to 50 hours per week with the Hope Dental Clinic in Elk City, Okla. Photo by James Pratt
The breakdown of care offered at Oklahoma Free Clinics. Source: Oklahoma State Department of Health
MENTAL 15.29%
D
onald Lamar’s knee bounces up and down, generating a quick staccato rhythm. Today he is getting a tooth extracted, and his pleasant, nervous banter makes the other patients feel like old friends.
“What did the cat say when he was waiting for his tail to be cut off?” Lamar says with a sparkle in his eye. “Won’t be long now!” His big laugh fills the waiting room of Hope Dental Clinic in Elk City,
Okla. The room is much like any other doctor’s office—meticulously clean, ample chairs lining the walls—but there is one key element missing: a credit card machine. The clinic has treated approximately 550 patients completely free of
charge since its opening in April 2011. Hope Dental Clinic is one of 85 volunteer-driven, donor-supported free health clinics listed with the Office of Primary Care and Rural Health Development located in the Center for Health Innovation and Effectiveness with the Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH). The state works to help charitable clinics thrive through the Oklahoma
Volunteer Charitable Healthcare Provider Program. This program provides state malpractice insurance coverage to volunteer health care practitioners who provide care to medically indigent persons at a free clinic, or specialty providers providing care, as a result of a referral from a free clinic. Since the program’s inception in 2008, 286 health care providers have entered into contracts with the OSDH for tort coverage. “By recognizing these charitable providers as state employees for purposes of immunity, this coverage encourages health care providers to contribute their services to the most vulnerable populations in their community with- out the fear of liability and lawsuits,” Valorie Owens, manager of statewide access to care planning with the Office of Primary Care and Rural Health
Development at the OSDH Center for Health Innovation and Effectiveness says. The program encourages physicians attending dentist, Dr. Roy
like
Thornbrough, to volunteer time and services. The Northfork Electric Cooperative (NFEC) member has plenty to do with his practice and family ranch in Sayre, Okla., but he says spending his day off with the clinic is meaningful.
“It’s not that I love extracting teeth that much,” Dr. Thornbrough says with a grin. “I want to give back to the people.”
Answering the Call to Care Tim Ball, director of operations for the Hope Dental Clinic, has earned
the nickname “Swiss Army Knife.” He is the clinic’s IT department, x-ray technician, licensed pharmacy technician and janitor, among many other duties. The retired air force pilot volunteers 40 to 50 hours per week improving
the health of the impoverished and what he refers to as the “working poor,” those who live in the gray area between poverty and middle class. “I was part of the problem before I became involved in compassionate ministry,” Ball says. “I didn’t see the connection between poverty and com- munity stability. Now, poverty and its implications are all I see wherever I go.” The clinic only serves patients whose income falls below the federal
MEDICAL 84.71%
MEDICAL 84.34%
Over the last two years, the nation’s 1,200 free and charitable clinics have seen a 40 percent increase in patient demand
Source: National Association of Free & Charitable Clinics 14
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