Free Clinic Taps Retired Doctors
When Dr. Jerrold Kaplan retired from his full-time cardiology practice in 2000, he quickly discovered that a life focused on leisure wasn’t his cup of tea. So after a few months of golfing and traveling, Kaplan signed up with the Samaritan House Free Clinic of San Mateo, where he now spends half a day each week treating patients.

Kaplan, 66, is one of about 35 physicians who donate their time and services to the Samaritan House Free Clinic of San Mateo, which provides primary and specialty medical care to low-income San Mateo County residents. Nearly all of the clinic’s volunteers – the nurses, translators and office staff, as well as the doctors – are over 60, and most are retired or semi-retired from full-time careers.

Dr. Jerrold Kaplan with a patient at the Samaritan House Free Clinic of San Mateo

“I’m delighted to be able to help these people who are so hard working and so grateful for the care we provide them,” says Kaplan, who has practiced medicine for more than 30 years. “The usual medical safety nets are not available for these people when they get sick or hurt, so we are meeting a real need.”

The clinic, located in a modest, one-story office building just off of El Camino Real, provides a wide range of healthcare services to the working poor of northern San Mateo County – the day laborers, gardeners, nannies and bus boys, mostly Latino, who earn just enough to be ineligible for Medi-Cal coverage, but can’t afford health insurance.

If not for the Samaritan House free clinic, these people would have little choice but to seek treatment at hospital emergency rooms. “We help fill in this gap in healthcare access for the uninsured and save emergency room resources for true emergencies,” says Dr. Stuart Viess, medical director at Samaritan House Free Clinic of San Mateo since November 2004.

In addition to primary medical care, the clinic offers such specialty services as dentistry, breast cancer screenings, psychiatry, vision care, gynecology, dermatology, podiatry and nutritional counseling, all at no cost to patients. The San Mateo clinic expects to handle more than 6,000 medical patient visits and 3,000 dental patient visits this year.

The Sam Mateo clinic, which opened in 1992, is funded primarily by Samaritan House, a non-profit that also helps low-income San Mateo County residents with food, shelter and other services. Mills-Peninsula Health Services provides Samaritan House with free X-ray and laboratory services. Prescription drugs – which the clinic dispenses free of charge to patients – are purchased from pharmaceutical companies at discounted prices.

A second Samaritan House Free Clinic, also staffed largely by retired doctors, opened in Redwood City in 2001. Most of the dozen or so doctors at this smaller clinic are affiliated with Redwood City’s Sequoia Hospital, which provides all the clinic's lab work and tests for free.

The success of these clinics “highlights the absurdity that we are writing off so many highly qualified doctors and nurses to early retirement at a juncture when millions go without access to quality care,” says Marc Freedman, president of Civic Ventures, a San Francisco non-profit whose goal is providing more opportunities for older people. “The doctors and other healthcare professionals at Samaritan House are harvesting decades of training to provide a kind of medical care that is hard to find in any setting today: one that blends experience with the time to listen and care.”

For many of the clinic’s volunteers, giving back is the primary motivation.

“I personally did not think I’d be doing something this after I retired. But I’m glad I did,” says Kaplan, who envisioned a life built around leisure activities when he retired. “It gives me a good feeling to be able to care for patients. And it helps keep me on my toes.”

Doctors also come to the Samaritan House clinics because it allows them to escape the bureaucracy of managed healthcare and gives them a chance to focus more on patient care than on paperwork. “Practicing here is similar to when I started practicing medicine. I have time to talk with patients,” explains Kaplan, who still works occasionally at his old Burlingame cardiology practice.

Like many Samaritan House doctors, Viess and Kaplan were recruited by Dr. Bill Schwartz, a retired member of UCSF’s clinical faculty who helped found the San Mateo clinic. Schwartz, who had a private practice in San Mateo, personally knew many of the physicians he’s recruited for the clinic. Earlier this year, Schwartz, 73, received the American Institute for Public Service’s Jefferson Award for making a difference in his community.

“The patient-doctor relationship is so strong here. That’s what I’d missed the most,” says Viess, a 67-year-old pulmonologist, who retired about four months before coming to Samaritan House.

“I was restless [after retiring] and it became clear that I really wanted to do something for the community,” adds Viess. “I knew Bill Schwartz well, and he keeps an eye out for retired doctors. When I came here with Bill and spent a couple of days, I was hooked.”

The Samaritan House facilities are the only free clinics in the Bay Area staffed mostly by retired medical professionals. Nationwide, there are about 40 free clinics staffed by retired volunteer doctors, many of them modeled after the Volunteers in Medicine Clinic that serves low-income residents of Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.

The Free Clinic of San Mateo is located at 19 West 39th Avenue. The phone number is (650) 578-0400. The Free Clinic of Redwood City is located at 114 5th Avenue. The phone number is (650) 839-1447. For more information, see www.samaritanhouse.com.

(This article originally appeared in the Summer 2005 issue of Bay Area Summit)

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