|
In 1989 a family practice physician with a practice
in Campbell, California was asked to see homeless patients residing in a shelter at Agnew Development Center in
Santa Clara, California without charge. Dr. Mark Campbell and his wife, Renata, responded to the call.
A new Rotarian, Dr. Campbell approached his Rotary Club
for help in funding the drugs needed to treat the patients he was seeing. Dr. Campbell's club was in District 5170.
When the District Governor, John Fisher, heard of the effort he became interested in taking it to other Rotary
clubs in the district. It wasn't long before these two leaders had interested other Rotarians and community members
in their dream and formed a charter board. They shortened "Rotary Cares" to form the name and RotaCare
was born.
From the beginning everyone involved agreed that it
was critical to provide care to those least able to obtain it and that the care and the medications needed to treat
the patient must be provided free of charge. This resolution became the mission of RotaCare.
As other clubs within District 5170 heard of the work
being done in Santa Clara, they became interested in starting a clinic within their own community. Ken Graham,
the first Executive Director of RotaCare, went to his club in Morgan Hill, California and the neighboring club
in Gilroy to start the second and third clinics. As these clinics formed, they realized that to sustain a clinic
over time they had to recruit a large pool of volunteers instead of depending on one or two people to staff the
clinic. This became the model on which all RotaCare clinics are based.
In today's world, medical professionals are able to
provide charity care only if they are covered by the necessary insurances. The board went through a 3-year process
of incorporating, obtaining 501(c)3 status, trademarking the RotaCare name throughout the United States, writing
the policies and procedures that allowed the clinics to be licensed by the State of California and obtaining malpractice
and other insurances.
With the successful completion of these tasks, the board
of directors felt it was time to let other Rotary Clubs and physicians know of the service project they had developed.
In 1995, the board received a grant from the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to
help them make this dream a reality. With funding from the grant, the board hired a part-time project director
and two part-time extension project managers to find Rotary Clubs and physicians interested in starting RotaCare
clinics in their own communities. Within six months of the beginning of the grant, ten communities began the process
of opening clinics.
|
