Ellen Beck
San Diego, California
How is your Hero working to make the world a better place?
Along with a group of passionate students and committed community partners, Ellen Beck MD serves as founder and director of the UC San Diego Student-Run Free Clinic Project (SRFCP), which for the past 13 years has provided high-quality, humanistic, comprehensive free health careincluding restorative dentistry, legal services, social work, pharmacy, and lab work. The SRFCP began in 1997 with 3 doctors and 5 students operating out of a church basement, raising money for supplies through bake sales. Today, 500 student health professionals each yearsupervised by physicians, dentists, pharmacists, social workers, lawyers, acupuncturists and mental health professionals from the communitysee more than 2,000 patients annually at its four clinical sites: 2 churches and 2 elementary schools. The majority of patients are working poor and more than 85% suffer from chronic diseases, such as diabetes, asthma and heart disease. Uniquely, the SRFCP dental clinic fulfills the greatest unmet medical need in the nation through restorative work -- not just pulling teeth since toothlessness often leads to joblessness. As a unique learning opportunity for several hundred medical, pharmaceutical, dental and integrative medicine students and a Fellowship in Underserved Healthcare, the SRFCP inspires a new generation of medical professionals to work with underserved communities. SRFCP also provides clinical work experienceoften the first step on the career ladder for low-income individuals who aspire to become health professionals. Dr. Beck has created the SRFCP to serve as a model for better health care and a better worldone heart at a time.
How has your Hero impacted your life and inspired you?
I have had the honor to work with Dr. Beck on strategic initiatives for the Student-Run Free Clinic Project as well as the founding of the new UCSD Center for Integrative Medicine. I have witnessed Dr. Beck's generosity and kindness paired with her intelligence, humor, humility and grace in situations ranging from homeless outreach to an intensive audit, from giving a speech before a graduating class to consoling an ill patient. In her work, her relationships, and her life, she emanates all the qualities I would attribute to a "hero."