The Latino Health Alliance, along with the OSU Medical Center, are taking steps to aid the local Latino community.
The La Clinica Latina Abrio Sus Puertas, at 2231 N. High St., offers a variety of free clinical services for area Latinos. The clinic includes services such as primary care, pregnancy care, pediatrics, cancer screenings and diabetes management.
It is open from 4 to 8 p.m. every other Tuesday. The clinic is available by appointment only, except for emergencies.
One of the issues facing Latinos today is health care, said Raquel Diaz-Sprague, president of the Latino Health Alliance. Latinos are the most underpaid population in the country.
“Latinos take the jobs that nobody else wants,” she said. According to the census, Latino men earn 65 cents on the dollar compared to American men, and women earn 52 cents on the dollar, she said. For this reason, they can’t afford health care.
“The clinic gives Latinos a free resource for medical care,” said Dr. Cregg Ashcraft, the assistant clinical professor of internal medicine and pediatrics.
At area hospitals, it is difficult for some patients to receive the medical attention they need. They cannot communicate with the doctors or the hospital nurses because they only know Spanish, said Luis RodrÃguez-Romo, the president of the Asociation de Estudiantes Mexicanos. If no actual interpreter is available, some hospitals call up interpreters on the phone and do the translations.
Another project underway is trying to get OSU students to volunteer as interpreters at various hospitals throughout Columbus, RodrÃguez-Romo said. A meeting will be held Nov. 2 at the Ohio Union for students who want to volunteer as Spanish interpreters at the hospitals and other types of translator-related activities.
“There is a need for health services for individuals that speak Spanish as their primary language,” Diaz-Sprague said.
The majority of the staff at the clinic speak Spanish as their primary language, Diaz-Sprague said. All of the board and planning meetings are conducted in Spanish as well, she said.
The culture similarity is something that makes the patients feel more comfortable.
However, the clinic is not solving all the problems that Latinos are facing.
“It’s a temporary Band-Aid,” said Elena Costello, one of the volunteers. “There is only so much that we can do.”
The clinic cannot perform surgeries on those patients that need them, she said. Patients whothat have taken exams have to wait two weeks before they can get back their results.
Many of the walk-ins, except for children, also have to be turned away, she said.
The greatest change that the clinic needs is size, Ashcraft said. It is too small now for the population group that they’re trying to take care of.
