For years, a core component of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation’s (SNF) health efforts in Greece has been affiliated nonprofit Regeneration & Progress’s Mobile Medical Units, which travel to remote islands and areas in Greece to deliver free diagnostic exams and care to residents. When the pandemic hit and exacerbated gaps in access to care, SNF looked for an opportunity to support similar work in the United States.
Remote Area Medical (RAM) organizes pop-up health clinics in remote, rural, or underserved communities to offer free primary care including basic diagnostics, as well as free vision care and dental care including same-day dentures.
RAM has organized pop-up clinics run entirely by volunteers, from the doctors to the logistics staff, in every US state except Hawaii. The host community finds a location for the pop-up—such as a local school, fairground, or house of worship—as well as places for the volunteers to sleep and eat, and everything needed to equip the clinic is unloaded from eighteen-wheelers. After a one, two-, or three-day clinic where doctors provide referrals for continuing care as needed, the whole setup is packed back into the trucks to head to the next destination.
Building on a first grant made during the COVID-19 pandemic, SNF made another grant to RAM to provide support toward the nearly 100 clinics scheduled to take place throughout 2024.