UCLA Partnership Will Bring Healthcare to Underserved
UCLA students and physicians help bring primary care to one of the city's poorest communities
When it opens in Fall 2007, the Sun Valley Community Health Center will
represent a unique partnership between the David Geffen School of Medicine at
UCLA, Los Angeles County, the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and
the Northeast Valley Health Corporation.
A modern 10,000-square-foot clinic, the center is being built on the campus of Sun
Valley Middle School to serve a community of 53,000 mostly working-class
and low-income Latino residents that historically has lacked adequate neighborhood healthcare
services. Rates of asthma, obesity and diabetes are significantly higher
than most of the rest of the county, leading Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky to
label Sun Valley "Ground Zero for the healthcare crisis in Los Angeles
County."
The center will offer free and low-cost preventive care, acute- and
chronic-disease management, dental care, mental health and adult and pediatric
medicine. LAUSD provided the land for the center, the county supplied $7 million
for construction, the Northeast Valley Health Corporation will provide
comprehensive healthcare services and the UCLA Department of Family Medicine
will offer expanded screening programs for the children and families of the
community.
With 13 examining rooms, a pharmacy, lab, counseling offices and education
and training rooms, the clinic will be the largest and most comprehensive
schoolbased clinic in the United States. Those involved with the project have
aspirations beyond Sun Valley. "We view what we are doing here as a model for
similar partnerships to meet the healthcare needs of underserved communities
elsewhere in the country," says Patrick T. Dowling, M.D., M.P.H., chair of the
UCLA Department of Family Medicine and a driving force behind the clinic. The
clinic also will serve as a training site for UCLA medical students and an
elective for UCLA family-medicine residents, helping them, through direct
intervention in an underserved community, to gain a greater understanding and
appreciation of communitybased healthcare delivery and access. In addition, Dr.
Dowling observes, "We hope that the presence of our students and trainees on
campus will inspire some Sun Valley students to consider a career in
healthcare."
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