The PCC Community Wellness Center opened a new location April 3, in south Oak Park, just west of Austin.
The new clinic, located at 6030 W. Roosevelt, is the fifth health center in the PCC chain. the South Family Health Center opened in a location formerly owned by Resurrection Health Care. The Resurrection clinic closed a year ago.
Located in the block west of Austin Boulevard, the clinic is on the border of four communities?”Oak Park, Berwyn, and Cicero and just north of the Austin “Island” community, which contains a cluster of factories, residential bungalows, apartment buildings, and two schools.
The new center will specifically target the Berwyn and Cicero communities, which has a significant Hispanic population, but will open its doors to anyone uninsured or under-insured, said Ceal Bacom, clinical director of PCC’s South Family Center.
The south clinic has been accepting patients since opening. It has four operational exam rooms and is currently offering pre-natal care and family planning.
Bacom and two of the clinic’s other certified nursing midwives worked for the Resurrection clinic before being laid off in March 2005.
“We’re excited to be back in this community,” said Bacom, who worked for the last year at PCC’s Salud Family Center at 5359 W. Fullerton, along with the other former Resurrection midwife nurses. The new clinic is expected to serve an additional 3,000 patients.
PCC offers uninsured and under-insured patients such services as an OB/Gyn clinic, prenatal care classes, home births and immunizations. The South Family Clinic is expected to add those services in the near future, said Lynn Hopkins, director of Development and Outreach Services.
The South Family Clinic is open Monday through Friday and Wednesday evening. The staff, including family practice physicians, is on call regularly, said Bacom. All of the midwife nurses and support staff at the South Family clinic are bilingual in Spanish, she said.
PCC expects to hire a full-time family practice physician by July. A fourth midwife nurse may be added, said Hopkins.
PCC applied for federal funding for the south Oak Park clinic in May 2005, but it was held up because of budget restraints. The new site costs more than $500,000 to cover patient services.
“We had been eager and ready to go and finally got it open,” said Hopkins.
The center has had referrals from PCC’s Salud Family Health Center, and residents familiar with the old Resurrection clinic have been coming in, said Bacom.
“It’s kind of like a neighborhood clinic,” she said.
The new clinic has seen seven new obstetric patients in the last week, Bacom said.
“I’m surprised we’re as busy as we are. [Seven] doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s a good start.”
PCC’s other clinics are: the Lake Street Family Health Center, 14 W. Lake; Erie Court Health Center, 1 Erie Court; and Austin Family Health Center, 335 N. Mason.
Hopkins said there are no immediate plans to add another health center.
PCC serves more than 25,000 patients annually and conducts 83,000 visits a year, mostly middle- to low-income patients.
“No one is ever turned away because of an inability to pay,” said Hopkins.
For more information about the PCC’s South Family Center, call 708/386-0845.
CONTACT: tdean@wjinc.com
