The Clinic

Phoenixville, Pa.
Grant Amount: $25,000

The Clinic, which opened in 2002, provides primary health care to those who do not qualify for Medicare or Medicaid, and often their income is just over the requirement based upon 150 percent or 200 percent of the federal poverty guidelines. Their patients come from the five-county Philadelphia area as well as the states of New Jersey and Delaware. The Clinic does not have a sliding fee scale based on income or geography; patients are simply asked to pay what they feel they can afford. It costs The Clinic approximately $59.55 per office visit with a physician; the average patient contribution is $16.50.

The Clinic has over 120 volunteers who regularly provide over 15,600 hours of medical and clerical services each year. For this past year, the clinic saw 1,579 new patients and, overall had 9,951 visits.

A grant of $25,000 will be awarded for their Diabetes Management Program. The Clinic currently sees 400-500 diabetic patients per year, 100 of whom are insulin-dependent. All of the patient require glucose-testing machines and test strips so they can monitor their blood sugar levels twice a day. While pharmaceutical companies will often provide the testing machines for free to the patients, The Clinic must still purchase the test strips, at a cost of $100 per month, per patient. Grant funds will help support purchasing test strips, insulin, and informational pamphlets in English and Spanish.