By LINDA CHION KENNEY
Donned in her springtime best from hat to shoes, Riverview resident Jan Essenwein entered the multipurpose room at the St. Andrews United Methodist Church in Brandon to partake of savory and sweet tastings served on behalf of the Outreach Free Clinic and Resource Center.
“There’s a group of us here from our garden club, and I love tea,” Essenwein said, at the High Tea and Fashion Show held April 13 at the church. Among them was June Huebner, who said of the event, “I like the food, it’s different, and you get to dress up.”
More important, Essenwein and Huebner were among the approximately 200 attendees who came to support the free clinic’s mission, which has become especially important as wages become tapped against steep cost-of-living increases.
According to the 2024 Tampa Bay E-Insights Report, published by the University of South Florida Muma College of Business and sponsored by Florida Blue, housing expenditures are now more than 42 percent of the average household budget. Combined with transportation costs, that figure rises to 57 percent.
Linda Chion Kenney Photos
Jan Essenwein of Riverview looks over the silent auction table at the High Tea and Fashion Show fundraiser for the Outreach Free Clinic and Resource Center.
Outreach Free Clinic and Resource Center board members Ada Tapper, left, and Melissa Poage
The Florida legislature this year passed a bill, known as Live Healthy, which earned high marks from the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops, among many others. In a news update, conference officials noted the shortfall of nearly 18,000 doctors and 59,000 nurses projected for Florida by 2035, as the state’s population grows to more than 25 million people in 10 years.
“As a result,” the item notes, “Live Healthy seeks to expand access to care by growing Florida’s health care workforce and by increasing the availability of free clinics and primary, behavioral health and crisis intervention services.”
In an interview before the start of the April 13 tea, Melissa Poage, an Outreach Clinic board member, took note of the Live Healthy legislation passed this year. She spoke on the eligibility for medical care through free clinics, including diagnostic testing, laboratory tests, diagnosis, treatment and follow-up care.
A qualified free clinic patient is one who works and lives in Hillsborough County and before this year’s legislation, had a gross monthly household income (per household size) between 139 percent and 200 percent of the federal poverty level. Poage said that with Live Healthy, that threshold has increased to 300 percent of the federal poverty level, which for a family of three is $77,460. Prior to the increase, the cutoff at 200 percent amounted to $51,640.
With the legislation, “they’re filling a gap,” Poage said. “They’re providing health care to people who can’t get it anywhere else, and that’s getting harder and harder to do right now because our state’s not big on expanding Medicaid.”
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Medicaid is a joint federal and state program that helps cover medical costs for some people with limited income and resources. The federal government has general rules that all state Medicaid programs must follow, but each state runs its own program, which means benefits can vary from state to state.
Jan Essenwein, left, and High Tea and Fashion Show attendee June Huebner
Given the state of Medicaid in Florida, the Live Healthy legislation “means more people qualify for free clinic care,” Poage said.
Count among them a 27-year-old woman from Canada in Florida working with an employment visa. Her story was recounted at the tea, as an Outreach Clinic volunteer read the woman’s letter of gratitude for clinic services “at a time of great need.”
During a routine shower, the woman discovered a lump in her breast, which caused her great concern, and especially so with her family’s history of breast cancer. Her older sister died of the disease at age 32.
The woman said the assistance and resources received through the clinic helped her through a “stressful and worrisome” time. And that while her lump was determined to be benign, she remains a high-risk patient. That makes the series of X-rays, biopsies and mass removal she received through the clinic as important as the follow-up care she now receives.
“Your organization’s dedication to providing health care to those in need is commendable and truly life-changing,” the woman’s note concludes. “It is crucial to recognize the importance of supporting nonprofit organizations like yours, as they play an important role in ensuring individuals facing challenging circumstances receive the care they need.”
Since opening in 1987 as the Brandon Outreach Clinic, the institution today has dropped the location moniker to better reflect its work with residents throughout Hillsborough County, including the Greater Riverview area and beyond. Then and now, medical professionals donate their services to ensure working people who can’t afford medical expenses get the care they need.
A decorated “Elvis” table at the High Tea and Fashion Show fundraiser at St. Andrew’s United Methodist Church
That would include Ada Tapper, who since 2003 has volunteered with the Outreach Free Clinic, first as a nurse practitioner and now also as a board member. Tapper is a U.S. Army reservist and owner of ACT Health Solutions, a mobile health care practice.
The Outreach Free Clinic and Resource Center, manned primarily by volunteers, “is now seeing patients three days a week,” Tapper said. “We provide primary care, chronic care, acute care, preventative services, well women care and just about anything someone needs to be healthy.” Funds raised at the high tea and at the clinic’s comedy night fundraiser in October “will help us meet our mission,” Tapper said.
For more on the clinic and its upcoming fundraiser, visit www.theoutreachclinic.com/. The clinic is at 517 North Parsons Ave., Brandon. Call 813-654-1388.