For many people, access to health care can be uncertain. But this weekend, hundreds of Capital Region residents received care free of charge.
Schuylerville High School is remarkably full for a Saturday over spring break.
That’s because local volunteers with the Southern Adirondack Health Initiative and Remote Access Medical, or RAM, are here to provide as much dental, vision, and health care as they can to anyone who walks through the door.
If you ask any of the dozens of volunteers why they choose to spend their weekends like this, you’re bound to get a reason like the one shared by Don Franks.
“The first RAM clinic that I was at, I was doing computer stuff like adding the services that people had and I had one patient come up and he had his mouth full of gauze because he had just had teeth pulled and everything. He handed me his paper work with one had and shook my hand while crying with the second hand. And that sold me from then on,” said Franks.
He’s not alone. Most of the people lending a hand are repeat volunteers.
RAM, which is a national organization that provides free health care through community-driven clinics across the country, only goes where it’s welcome. That means the organization requires a local partner organization, like Southern Adirondack Health Initiative, to facilitate each clinic.
As his day job, Joe Fitchel works as an optician. But for the past three years he’s travelled across the country with RAM.
“Our system’s broken, everybody knows that. I can’t fix the system, but I can help that person over there see. And then I can help the next person see, and I can help the next person see. Everybody deserves to see,” said Fitchel.
Fitchel says there is a growing list of reasons individuals might rely on receiving care from a RAM clinic, but he’s happy to facilitate it all the same.
“We've got people who come in, we've got a full eye exam set up next door to us. They're going to come out with a prescription. They come in, they pick out a pair of glasses. I have about between 300 and 400 pairs of glasses. These are glasses that I sold for $300 or $400 in my shop a few years ago. We fit you for them, we measure you so we lay everything out, right? Then I send the glasses out to my lab that's in the truck that came up here. They make them come back. I'm gonna put them on you, adjust them to you, and you get to walk out of here with a new pair of glasses,” said Fitchel.
All the time, money, and resources that go into a clinic come from donations to RAM.
Behind the school, volunteers in a trailer that was once a mobile car mechanic shop, pump out prescription lenses as efficiently as a NASCAR pit crew.
Rebecca Wood leads the three-person team. She’s been volunteering with RAM for the past decade.
Her daughter’s premature birth drained all of her savings, meaning she had to put off a much-needed dental procedure.
“I ended up getting an infection. It spread through my entire mouth and jaw. I had to go to the ER because the swelling was cutting off my airway here, and I was in the ER, and I got IV antibiotics, and then when I was discharged, he said, go to the dentist, because you're going to lose some teeth. The next day, I went to the dentist. I lost all of my teeth and parts of my jaw in a six-hour procedure under local anesthesia, because that is what I could afford. And I was very angry after that, so I wanted to do something with that, and I came here, and they taught me how to make glasses,” says Wood.
Wood is now set to graduate from law school in May.
“For me, it means so much. I was a single mom for a little while and this was my only access to health care for a bit and so it’s kind of paying that back. It’s also making sure what happened to me doesn’t happen to anyone else,” Wood says.
Sean Aycock only learned about the clinic late Friday. He says he hasn’t had a proper eye exam since graduating high school and getting his license.
“I’m just a local sewer guy. I work in the sewers and stuff like that. I’ve got a class A license. Obviously, eye exams are important. With inflation and everything and cost of medical insurance I just can’t afford health insurance. So, I got here about 4 or 5 o’clock in the morning,” said Aycock.
When he’s not driving to work, Aycock is staring at a CCTV screen to make sure sewer pipes are properly aligned.
Aycock got not one but two pairs of glasses from Saturday’s clinic.
“Now I’m set for a while. I’ve got a backup pair; I got another pair. I wore my one prescription for nine years. It’s been almost nine years. I think this year will be nine years since I’ve had any change in prescription, any new glasses, any new contacts. I’m running on super glue and duct tape glasses right now,” said Aycock.
According to the Southern Adirondack Health Initiative, more than 300 people received care over the weekend.
