An annual medical clinic aiming to shore up access gaps returned to the Capital Region this weekend, providing free healthcare to hundreds of locals in need.
Hudson Falls High School is busy, especially for a Sunday. But it’s not filled with students or parents – volunteers and Remote Area Medical Corps staff are coordinating the last few patients at this year’s clinic.
Karen Weinberg is wearing an impossible-to-miss high-vis jacket. She’s running on only a few hours of sleep, yet still manages to greet every volunteer and patient with a smile.
“This is where you see all the patients. This is where you get to tell them, ‘yes, we have this available,’ or ‘I think you came a little too late; we may not have any left,’ and it’s the hardest job in the world but it’s also the most gratifying because as I walk through the clinic people come up to me and give me a hug and say ‘thank you, thank you, thank you! We got our teeth, look at my teeth,’ or ‘here are my new glasses.’ So, you know, you really get to interact with people and get to see the good of the clinic,” said Weinberg.
RAM provides dental, vision, and health care via clinics across the country, co-organized with a community host group. This weekend’s clinic is with the Southern Adirondack Health Initiative.
Free services are made available by donations of funds through RAM and medical professionals volunteering in coordination with the host group.
Weinberg is the president of the local nonprofit, although, for the time being she’s on parking lot duty.
“A mother, her mother, and her three kids they were here at 5:45 [p.m.] when I was just packing up to go shower and get a couple hours of sleep, she was here. And then I came back at close to midnight and we already had three other cars,” said Weinberg.
After volunteering at RAM clinics around the nation, Weinberg decided to bring it home to Washington County in 2021.
Inside the school, there’s a busy check-in center where patients fill out paperwork and volunteers run basic blood tests to measure blood sugar levels.
“I was working as a nursing instructor when I saw the documentary about RAM on TV and I knew this is what I wanted to do. So, I’ve been a medical supervisor with RAM for 11 years and I love doing it and I love coming into the communities and talking with the patients and helping them get the healthcare that they deserve and sometimes just can’t get no matter what they do,” said Colleen Madigan.
Colleen Madigan is coordinating the various volunteering medical professionals. This year the clinic has a visiting phlebotomist, who’s helping run tests for diabetes, Hepatitis C, and HIV. This year, they’re also able to offer dermatology and podiatry services.
“The phlebotomist is doing all of our testing for us, and that's led to, I don't know exact numbers, but it's really increased the medical services that we're providing to this community, the extra services. It helps us with diagnosing and treating patients and who to refer them to. It makes it easier. We're doing women's health pap smears, breast exams, and then the community is providing vouchers for free mammograms and vouchers for colon cancer screening. And so, there's just a huge increase in the medical services. It's a great opportunity,” said Madigan.
Down one hallway a few classrooms have been turned into eye testing stations. Some people are waiting to be seen. Others are busy looking over the selection of frames – they’ll be leaving with a new free pair of glasses.
The basketball hoops and bleachers have been folded away in a large gymnasium to make room for dozens of individual dental care tents.
Volunteer Steve Howard came out from just outside Bemidji, Minnesota. He’s been volunteering at RAM clinics as a sanitation station worker for nine years.
“Some of my most rewarding ones have actually been when I finished a little early and we’re waiting on the vision people to finish and watch people who haven’t been able to see for decades and they put on the new pair of glasses we made on site. And you see them look around and the tears come to their eyes of joy and they’re looking at things we take for granted. ‘I can see the clock!’ And that type of thing, it’s incredible. And to know that we’re doing this thing and helping people, it’s so rewarding it brings tears to your eyes. Of course then you also think about, ‘gosh I hope they didn’t drive here with those,” said Howard.
Children are running in circles as their parents wait to be called up.
Though he's happy to wait, Merle Nichols has been waiting to be seen for about four hours.
“I've been having this mouth problem for years, and I've been going to my dentist back and forth, and then I heard it on the radio. I said, let me get another just basically a second opinion, and it's free,” said Nichols.
Nichols’ hands are cracked and he’s missing a few bottom teeth. He says he often feels ignored and overlooked when seeking medical help.
“Primary doctors don't look at you anymore. They look at, what you guys know all about, the computer. I walk in the room, there's no sense of me being there, because they're reading the computer. And then they send the blood sample to me. I take them, throw them right in the trash. Basically, if there's something wrong, they're going to tell you. So why do you got to go see a doctor? Because they ain't seeing you,” said Nichols.
At the clinic, however, things are different.
“They're real people, and they're looking at me, they're not looking—you see a few screens around, but when I go to my doctor, all they do is they set up a chair sit in front of the screen,” said Nichols.
Weinberg says that kind of emotional care is one reason why RAM clinics are so special.
“OK I don’t want to get choked up, but from the first clinic I worked as a volunteer for RAM the amount of kindness that you see—this won’t sound good on radio—is incredible. If you look around here you see people showing kindness to each other and it’s contagious. Patients show kindness to each other. I think when you’re in a state of lacking or you’re stressed out because you need something for yourself or your child, it’s hard to be kind to other people. And when people reach out to you and are kind to you it does become contagious,” said Weinberg.
There’s no barrier to entry for RAM clinics. Weinberg likes to say “you can come with empty pockets.” That distinction can mean a lot.
For one man who works at a dairy farm in the region and didn’t want to be identified out of fears spurred by recent ICE raids across the country, having a resource like a RAM clinic means he can get his dental discomfort sorted without endangering his family.
Ruth Hernandez is one of a dozen translators on-hand.
“He says ‘I feel very happy to be here. Our situation is a little hard to not have the resources to get this care, so I’m just very happy to get this care,” said Ruth Hernandez.
Hernandez works at Life Works Community Action Immigrant Services. She and some colleagues came to volunteer through the weekend.
“Those barriers that exist for the population we work with are eliminated completely. So, it’s awesome. We’re happy to be here and we’re happy to support this work for sure,” said Hernandez.
RAM CEO Jeff Eastman is on-site as well. He says free clinics can be a vital resource to those in need.
“On the health care side, you've got to navigate the system, are they in network? Are they out of network? Oh, by the way, when I go the emergency room, guess what? It's a contracted company. It's not even in the network that I checked on. And also, I've got to take time off from work, so it's so it's a double whammy. I've got this expense. I got to take time off for work, and I've got to make those hard decisions, clothing the family, feeding the family, paying the rent, paying the utilities. RAM is not the solution. What we are is to help fill the gap,” said Eastman.
RAM puts on hundreds of clinics across the country with varying levels of services every year. In 2024, it treated more than 35,000 patients.
He says the care access issues that folks in the Southern Adirondacks are facing aren’t unique.
“Doesn’t matter where you are in the country. You can throw a dart and hit anywhere. It can be the richest county, one of the richest ones in Orange County, California, it can be Bradenton, Florida. I could be Philadelphia. We’ve had clinics 10 minutes from the White House and had the mailmen come to our clinics,” said Eastman.
By the end of the weekend the clinic treated an estimated 300 patients at no cost.
Weinberg says she’d like to expand the services provided next year by bringing in additional medical specialists and deepening the pool of dentists and optometrists on hand. She also hopes it will become easier legally for medical professionals in neighboring states to volunteer in New York.
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