Muslim Clinics Fill Health Care Needs

May 11, 2008

Author: ALEXIS GRANT

Source: The Houston Chronicle

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/metro/5771549.html

Elena Lopez needed diabetes medication and was due for a medical exam, but the 64-year-old had no health insurance.

So her daughter, Rosa Ramirez, took Lopez to the Ibn Sina Foundation community clinic in southwest Houston, where she paid a small fee to see a doctor on a walk-in basis.

"Otherwise, I couldn't afford to take her to the doctor," said Ramirez, who lives near the facility.

The clinic is one of many Muslim health facilities popping up across the country, according to a report by the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, a national nonprofit, policy-research organization. Most have a base cliental of Muslims but serve the broader community.

The facilities "represent a new trend in the American Muslim community to sort of claim a space in the public health movement in addressing fundamental health problems," said Lance Laird, a professor at Boston University School of Medicine who wrote the report.

See also: Islam, Civic, Health