Taking
By JONATHAN EPSTEIN i
UNLESS additional funding is
found, the Free People's
Clinic of Ann Arbor will be
forced to shut down by the end
of the year.
Located on 225 East Liberty
Street, the Clinic is open three
evenings a week and currently
provides primary health care
to about forty patients weekly.
In addition, the Clinic sponsors
Children Health Fairs in which
free physical examinations, im-
munizations, and hearing tests
are given, and participates with
several other Ann Arbor area
health care facilities in Project
Unicorn, a program designed to
meet the financial needs of the
elderly in those areas not, cov-
ered by private medical insur-
ance or government aid pro-
grams.
When compared to other low-
FREE PEOPLES CLINIC
the pinch out of health care
cost health clinics in Ann Ar-
bor, the patient load of the Free
People's Clinic is not large; in
a week, the University Hospital
Adult Walk-In Clinic absorbs ap-
proximately 320 patients, while
the St. Joseph Mercy Hospital
Walk-In takes in 150. Two low-
cost health care clinics admin-
istered by the non-profit Sum-
mit Medical Center, Inc., re-
ceive over 600 patient visits
weekly.
The Free People's Clinic is
likely to be the only Possible
source of health care for those
who use its facilities. The aver-
age fee collected from F r e e
People's Clinic patients is less
than one dollar. In contrast, the
walk-in clinics of the two hos-
pitals usually charge about ten
dollars per patient visit, while
the average fee charged by the
Summit Medical Center Clinics
THE FREE PEOPLES Clinic . . . the only affordable source
of health care for those who use its facilities. Its average fee:
Less than a dollar.
"There is need for ex-
pansion of the Free
People's Clinic; due, to
the limited operating
hours, the Clinic is cur-_
rently forced to t u r n
away as many patients
as it serves."
is between seven and e i g h t
dollars. A FPC survey indicates
that over half of its )arients
earn less than $3,000 annually,
an income level which p-obably
precludes the use of other health
care clinics in Ann Arbor.
THE CLIENTELE of the Free
People's Clinic is mainly com-
posed of self-supporting young
people. During hte initial estab-
lishment of the clinic, transient
youths formed a significant part
of the Clinic's patient load, but
presently an overwhelming ma-
jority of clinic patients are per-
manent residents of the A n n
Arbor community who use the
FPC on a regular basis.
The clinic provides extensive
health care counseling in addi-
tion to medical treatment. Be-
fore seeing a member of the
FPC's volunteer staff of physic-
ians, each patient is given the
opportunity to discuss health
concerns with an FPC patient
advocate. Patients of the clinic
contend that the FPC's counsel-
ing services humanize health
care whereas most medical fa-
cilities in Ann Arbor are thought
to be cold, impersonal intitu-
tions. In essence, it seems that
large numbers of FPC patients
prefer the treatment offered at
the clinic to that of other health
care facilities, and many of
them could not afford to u s e
other facilities on a long term
basis.
Mrs. Janet Klaver, a member
of the board of direcors of
Summit Medical Center, Inc.,
feels the Free Peo,,e's Clinic
furnishes "an essential sntice"
to the Ann Arbor com-nimity
BUT, BECAUSE of the Cyn-
ic's desire to avoid prohibitive
patient charges, the FPC faces
financial difficulties. The clin-
ic has asked the city of Ann
Arbor for $117,355 in Federal
revenue sharing funds. Over
half the sum was requested to
expand the operations of t h e
Clinic. The Free People's Clin-
ic also wants funds to hire a full-
time physician, increase the
number of paid admisistrative
staff, and finance downpayment
costs for a permaneaI facility.
The offices of the Free Peo-
ple's Clinic are presettly on the
second floor of a building lack-
ing an elevator. Kevin Conway,
one of the six administrative co-
ordinators of the Clinie, points
out that the ofices are b o t h
cramped and inaccessible to eld-
erly patients.mA new Ifcility
with a full-time do.ctor would
permit an expansion of Clioic
services to serve over I5' itr-
sons a week.
Such an expansion is neces-
sary, according to toe FPC re-
quest for revenue shar'.gi mon-
ies because, "with he reloca-
tion of St. Joseph Mercy Hospi-
tal to Superior Township, need
for low-cost health care wIll
"The Free People's Clinic is likely to be the
only possible source of health care for those
who use its facilities. The average fee collected
from Free People's Clinic'patients is less than
one dollar."
rise considerably in our city." the Citizens' Committee on Com-
IT SHOULD be noted, how- munity' Development Revenue
ever, that St. Joseph M e r c y Sharing, a group appHinted by
Hospital will not be moving un- Mayor Al Wheeler to establish a
til the summer of 1977, and the tentative allocation of Federal
hospital has indicated it may revenue sharing funds.
leave its walk-in clinic in Ann Spencer Maidlow, an assistant
Arbor. St. Joseph will net make administrator of St. J o s e p h
a final decision concnrning t h e Mercy Hospital, declares, "the
eventual location of its walk-in Free People's Clinic is adding
facilities until an ou'side con- beneficially to the health care
sultant's study on ambulatory resources of Ann Arbor." If the
health care services in the Ann city of Ann Arbor does refuse
Arbor area, sponsored by 'ise to fund the Clinic, it will be
local hospitals, is completed. denying adequate healh care to
But even if the walk in clinic a portion of its population.
of St. Joseph Mercy Hospital re- Jonathan Epstein is a jun-
mains in Ann Arbor, there a s ir economics major.
need for expansion of the Free
People's Clinic; due to limited
operating hours, the Clinic is
currently forced to turn awaya
as many patients as it serves.
One might still question the
desirability o Clinic expansion STIGTERCR
for the sake ofaccomodating SETTING THE RECOR
elderly patients; eldery people STRAIGHT
may not feel comfortable with An error was made in Wednes-
the younger patients of the 1,in- day's guest editorial describing
ic. Dr. Bob Soderstrom, a resi- Mary Nash as a member of the
dent physician at Univeruity "People's Bicentennal Commit-
hospital and a member of t h e tee". She is actually a member
FPC's volunteer medical staff, of the planning committee for
stated that "it might be impos- the Chicago People's Bicenten-
sible to merge the two clien- nial Festival to be held June 29.
tele." The Festival will mark the cul-
Another member of the Clin- mination of the 21st Convention
ic's physician staff suggested of the Communist Party, U.S.A.
that the Free People's Clinic The planning committee and the
could establish separate sessions festival have no connection with
for the elderly in much the the Peoples Bicentennial Com-
same manner that they present- mission.
ly reserve Wednesday nights for
gynecology cases.
DR. SODERSTROM did feel
that a salaried physician would
be of great benefit to lie clinic;
a full time doctor would permit
the regular patients of the Free
People's Clinic to be seen by
the same physician an succeed-
ing visits. In addition, the uncer-
tainty created by the recent in-
crease in malpractice litigation
has had a negative effect on the
Clinic's ability to maintain a
stable volunteer doctor staff.
An administrative cordinator of
the clinic believes, "the Free
People's Clinic will not be able
to sustain its present level of
services without the assistance
of a salaried physician."
The future level of FPC servi
ces rests to a large degree with
The Michigan Daily
Edited and managed by Students at the
University of Michigan
Tuesday, June 24, 1975
News Phone: 764-0552
The President#:
Different face,
same old sonhg
By PAUL HASKINS
HAD A WAYWARD American couple dropped out
of circulation at some point three or four years
ago, and spent the ensuing seasons puttering around
the Aleutians in search of the great frozen treas-
are, only to return this week, they would have found
this country in pretty much the same fix it was
in in 1971. And the discovery wouldn't have phased
them in the least. Why .should it have?
Before their departure for the boonies, the Nixon
Doctrine had already been shaved and honed to a
keen edge, social programs had been demoted to.
yesterday's fashion, big business was gearing up
for its Mideast extravaganza and lesser domestic
sideshows and the national leadership was over-
powering those opposition elements it couldn't keep
down through sheer intimidation,
The present-day derivatives of those somewhat
imposing trends are the results of a fairly strange
political evolution that was triggered at some point
soon after the transient twosome's departure -- an
evolution the likes of which had never been wit-
nesed before and whose inpect and extent are still
being debated by those who debate such things.
What we're finding out now is that the strongest
feature of the multiple explosion that was Water-
gate, Spiro, ITT, et al left us with a political ter-
rain virtually identical to the one Richard Nix n
plotted before his demise. Somehow all the poli-
tical traditions, perceptions and power channels pre-
sumedly blown skyhigh and forever altered by Water-
gate have reassembled and settled into the exact
same patterns they always occupied.
THE WAYWARD Americans that returned this
week would feel right at home in the country they
left four years ago, because, in fact, it is the same
country, run by the same indomitable unseen powers,
motivated by the same production ethic, and blind
to the same challenuges to survival it has always
been curiously incapable of perceiving.
The wayward Americans would see a different
man in the White House. Instead of a ski-slope nose,
they would see a skull of granite. But only
superficial changes. Maybe radical plastic surgery
undergone in hopes of improving his public image.
He always was an image man. But the words would
be unmistakeably the same. The intonations identi-
cal, and the eyes . . . certainly the eyes, looking
at you, but really right around you.
GERALD FORD is a lie. A grand deception, a
lousy joke. Maybe not in and of himself. He might
even mean well, for what that's worth. It might
make a good epitaph or something. But in the con-
text of what this country has gone through in
the past four years, of the shakes, both up and
down, Gerald Ford stands as an obstruction in the
national plumbing. We thought we were getting
Drano, but what we got stuck with was just
another clog.
Goodby, reform-hello, stripmining.
Paul Haskins is The Daily Editorial Director.