I chose Western Tidewater Free Clinic and the opportunity that a volunteer can experience is giving patient’s medications and provide education and instructions. You can also work as a Pharmacy Tech and dispense medication or be a triage nurse which you probably shadow someone doing.

The mission of Western Tidewater Free Clinic is to provide high-quality, non-emergency health care to the residents of Western Tidewater who can’t afford to go to a hospital. They are a non-profit as well. The type of services they provide are medical care, dental care, vision care, women health program, medical specialists, mental health counseling, pharmacy services and referrals. They address all the people in the community that can’t afford to go to the hospital for medical care or don’t have insurance to go to places like the dentist and they don’t have to worry about paying for the services because they are included. This is important to the community because it is the only place that people that are uninsured are safe knowing that they are being taken care of without worrying about paying the fees later. Every $1 donated equals over $6 in services. They don’t care about the money; they care about the people in their community being healthy and safe. https://youtu.be/OjSd1BZbuX4 there is the 10th anniversary video from the clinic that I inserted.

My opinion about the importance of health has definitely changed. People care so much about other people’s well-being in their own community that they made a non-profit for people that are uninsured to make sure that they got the proper healthcare that they need and deserve. It shows that people are more compassionate and are willing to keep people safe and healthy in their community, meaning they have to help them.

Their services relate to me because they have medical services which could mean things like triage, dispensing medication out in the pharmacy, and even shadowing in the dentist’s office. It definitely could relate to the Dental Hygiene degree program because they deal with dental care as well, not just other medical issues. I would not pursue Dental Hygiene as my parallel major because I do not like teeth and just am not interested in learning about teeth and what can happen to them.