Clinic Serves Scranton's Uninsured Patients
A woman needs treatment for a knee injury, but she has recently been removed from her mother’s insurance. A construction worker with no insurance has an earache. An uninsured student from Bolivia needs a physical, which turns up a heart murmur.
These are just some of the patients who have found help at the Leahy Center Clinic for the Uninsured in Scranton.
“This is probably medicine in its purest form,” said Gregory Borowski, MD.
The Scranton endocrinologist has been involved with the clinic since the early planning stages about two years ago.
“Some members of the Lackawanna County Medical Society board decided that there are a lot of people who just don’t have health care, and we wanted to provide some health care for them. We decided to look into starting a free health clinic,” Borowski said.
Around that time, Marion Munley, the medical society’s executive medical director, accepted a position at the University of Scranton, where she learned that they were trying to revitalize the Leahy Center to gain better clinical experience for its nursing and therapy students.
“She thought it would be a neat fit because the medical society wanted to set up a free clinic and the university had all these resources,” Borowski said.
The next year was spent fundraising, acquiring equipment, and planning. The clinic was able to secure about $200,000 in grants. It also received donated equipment from a primary care center that was closing its doors. Local hospitals donated lab and X-ray services, and primary care and subspecialists in the area agreed to donate their services as well.
The clinic opened quietly in November 2007 and celebrated its grand opening in February 2008. Staffed by a volunteer nurse practitioner and a physician from the Lackawanna County Medical Society and located in the basement of McGurrin Hall at the University of Scranton, the clinic is open from 2 to 6 PM on Thursdays. It has averaged between 12 and 30 patients each night.
Borowski is one of the clinic’s physician volunteers and said he has enjoyed helping those without insurance.
“When you initially think of going into medicine, this is probably what a physician really thinks about—none of the political and legal issues that revolve around medicine but helping people who really need the help. It’s probably the most satisfying part of being in medicine,” he said.
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Last Updated: 11/20/2008