Mobile Medical Care Inc.
Providing free or low-cost health care to those in need
By Amy Reinink
Shortly after being laid off from her job as an event planner, Stephanie Tiller discovered two lumps in one breast. Without health insurance, the Silver Spring resident feared she wouldn’t be able to afford a doctor’s visit.
Enter Mobile Medical Care, aka “MobileMed,” a roving medical service that offers free or low-cost health care to several thousand of Montgomery County’s poor, homeless, uninsured and underinsured residents. Fifteen weekly clinics are held at community centers, churches and even in the organization’s three “vans”—RVs outfitted with examination rooms, computers, medications and other primary-care equipment.
“Without MobileMed, I don’t know what would have happened to me,” says Tiller, whose MobileMed lab work revealed that both lumps were benign. “They were so kind, so compassionate and so thorough. I actually think I got better care there than at the expensive doctors I saw in Bethesda when I had health insurance.”
MobileMed was founded in 1968 by Drs. Herman “Arnold” Meyersburg, a psychiatrist from Kensington, and pediatrician George Cohen of Rockville. While tutoring low-income children, Meyersburg saw the need for good, affordable health care. He, Cohen and other volunteers started offering free medical services in the basement of a Methodist church in Kensington one evening a week. Exam “rooms” were separated by bedsheets hung from the rafters, and medical supplies were stored at Meyersburg’s house.
“We didn’t have the funds for anything fancy,” Cohen says.
More than 40 years later, MobileMed has 125 volunteer doctors, nurse practitioners and other professionals providing care to an ever-growing clientele. Meyersburg died in 2007, but Cohen still volunteers a few days a week at age 84.
Despite its growth, “the mission—to bring primary medical care to the underserved—is still the same,” Cohen says.
MobileMed’s patients come from more than 100 countries and speak 25 languages. The organization works closely with community groups such as the Chinese American Senior Services Association and the Korean Community Service Center to provide translation services and to break down cultural barriers to seeking care, says Executive Director Peter Lowet.
MobileMed’s $2.5 million annual budget is funded mostly by contracts and grants, as well as patient fees and donations. Patients are charged $40 per visit, but no one is turned away for an inability to pay. The organization also receives $4.5 million annually in in-kind contributions, meaning volunteer hours, services and equipment provided by its partner hospitals, Lowet says.
In addition to primary care, MobileMed provides free or subsidized prescription medicines, lab work and referrals to Suburban Hospital and the National Institutes of Health.
“MobileMed has really figured out a great model for how to serve Montgomery County’s most vulnerable residents,” says Monique Sanfuentes, director of community health and wellness at Suburban in Bethesda.
