- The latest partnership between Vineland School District and Kern Medical provides students, staff and community members access to a mobile clinic.
- The clinic offers physicals, vaccinations, immunizations, hearing and visual screenings to name a few.
- Patients can walk up to Kern Medical’s administration team to register using their medical insurance, if the patient does not have insurance, their administrative team is equipped to help register them on the spot.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Students, staff, and community members at Vineland School District can now treat their medical needs without going to a doctor's office—this is all thanks to the district's latest partnership with Kern Medical.
"The superintendent of Vineland School District reached out to us for a need. They had a need to target their children," said Clinical Director for Ambulatory Services for Kern Medical Alicia Gaeta.
She told me the purpose of the partnership is to provide rural communities like Weedpatch with access to care.
"Oftentimes, parents have a hard time getting to the clinic to get their children taken care of because they have to work and it's hard to take time off of work, but what better way of us to meet them in the middle," explained Gaeta.
According to Vanessa Segura medical service assistant at Vineland School District, meeting parents in the middle is even more important come April when they expect an increase of fieldworkers in the community and in local camp sites.
"Some of them don't know the area," stated Segura. "They don't know where to go and for us to help them out and let them know that they can come out and they'll do the services for you—it's just very convenient for the families."
At the clinic, children are seen by a nurse practitioner and can receive services like wild-child physicals and vaccines, along with hearing and visual testing.
The mobile clinic also offers services to adults on a walk-in basis and if needed can also prescribe medication.
According to Senior Out-Patient Practice Manager for Kern Medical, Joyce Maldonado, the clinic's visitors can also receive other services.
"We can screen for hospital presumptive medical," said Maldonado. "The under-insured who want to come out to the Kern Medical mobile clinics we're able to screen them and submit their application in real time."
As someone who grew up in Arvin, Gaeta told me that this project hits close to home. "It's so heartwarming to know that I am coming back and being able to do what I love and do it for communities that I can relate to."
The mobile clinic will be stationed at Sunset Middle School every Tuesday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
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