SIMS hopes to complete health clinic in Mexico

January 8, 2004

SIMS volunteers pass out flyers about their free health care to a local family in Enseñada, Mexico.
A little girl with pigtails clenches her mother’s arm with a look of sadness. A man hangs his head down while massaging his temples. An elderly woman wipes her eyes with a tissue. These individuals in Mexico are part of the 60 percent in their region’s population who cannot afford health care. That is why they wait patiently to receive free health care from LLU Students for International Mission Service (SIMS).

Since the 1960s, LLU has been providing health care in Mexico. Every month a group of students, doctors, and other health professionals spend a weekend in Enseñada, Mexico, to help those who can’t afford a doctor. However, temporary locations for the clinic have prevented expansion and a permanent setting for its patients.

“For many years we have borrowed a state location to use as our clinic,” says Juan Carlos Belliard, PhD, MPH, assistant professor, international health. “However, when there is a change in government, we are often left without a clinic.”

Now there is a chance to solve that problem. A permanent clinic will be completed this year if SIMS can raise $10,000.

“Those we help in Mexico can’t access health care other than free clinics like ours,” explains Dr. Belliard, “especially when you look at dentistry. There is really no coverage for dental services. For medical care, we get people who have never been to a doctor before.”

This special building that is currently under construction belongs to the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Enseñada, Mexico.

“Once it is built, we can make long-term plans for the clinic and the activities that are going to happen within it,” says Dr. Belliard.

Along with SIMS and local church members of the Iglesia Adventista Church, the Van Nuys Seventh-day Adventist Church is helping construct the health clinic.

“I was talking with one of the members of the church in Mexico,” says Mike Kim, pastor, Van Nuys Seventh-day Adventist Church, “and he is looking forward to fulfilling the dreams they have in telling others about God through this clinic.”

Currently, SIMS provides health care in the Sabbath School rooms at Iglesia Adventista Church in Enseñada. “Because we don’t have a permanent and actual clinic, the health care LLU provides is limited,” says Maxine Newell, MPT, coordinator of SIMS Mexico trips, and DrPH student. “For example, we do minimal dental care because there is no way to bolt down our dental chairs at the church,” she explains.

For information on how to give a tax-deductible monetary gift for this project, you may contact SIMS by calling (909) 558-8089, visit their web site at www.llu.edu/llu/sims, or make a check out to Students for International Mission Service and send it to: SIMS, Loma Linda University, Nichol Hall Cottage 80, Loma Linda, California 92350.