Peditrician, Doctor Sandy Newmark has been volunteering at the Saint Andrew's Clinic in Nogales, Arizona for about 15 years.He first got involved with the clinic as an intern and resident at the University Medical Center in Tucson, Arizona and now has his own practice, the Center for Pediatric Integrative Medicine, near Saint Joseph's hospital.
Dr. Newmark estimates that he has helped about 1,000 children throughout his years of volunteering at St. Andrew's Clinic.
"I find this extremely rewarding. You give help to people who really, really need it and can't find it anywhere else," he says.
Working at this particular clinic for so many years Dr. Newmark has recieved hands on experience that he believes he could have never recieved at a regular clinic. He has seen some cases that he had never seen before volunteering at St. Andrew's.
"We don't treat accute conditions," he says. "for a lot of people this is the only place they can get any hope at all."
Very often he sees patients that he has helped in the past. One patient was about 5 years old when he first worked with him at the clinic and now he is about 18.
Not all conditions can be treated but with the medications that the clinic provides a lot of them can be made better.
The longest each patient goes without returning to the clinic is six months even if they are having no issues with medicine.
The reason for this is because "we can only give them medication for a certain amount of time," says Dr. Newmark.
Even if it appears that an individual no longer needs the medication or a smaller dosage that is not the family's decision to make, but the doctor's. Therefore it is important that the patient returns to the clinic regularly.
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