People's City Mission Medical Clinic cuts physician assistant position

As Lincoln continues to grow, so does the amount of people coming into The People's City Mission, according to CEO Pastor Tom Barber. But as resources are pulled to the shelter, they have to be taken away from other entities.

"What's happening right now is our cost of the shelter is expanding, we get almost all of our finances from the public or donations and as we have to divert more of our resources to the shelter we have to take a little less out of some of the other operations we have," he said.

Behind the shelter is a free medical clinic which saw 16,000 people last year. It offers free medical, dental, mental health services and more.

"With all of the changes in the health care program with insurance and the government going through various things it's caused a lot of sort of upheaval in that market and we have a lot of people who aren't insured who come into the clinic that really need us," he said.

But, it just cut the medical clinic's physician's assistant and is now all volunteers.

"We can't afford to have anyone full time," said Pastor Tom.

He said the clinic costs The Mission $250,000 annually. Besides cutting its one paid position, it's also cutting hours. It will be opened four days a week instead of five, being closed on Tuesdays. But, he said the dental clinic won't be affected.

"A lot of people depend on it, I know it's going to be a tough time for some folks, there are other programs out there for them but I know our clinic is very popular and we're hoping to get more doctors and volunteers to be back to full steam here pretty soon," said Pastor Tom.

To donate medical supplies, money, or volunteer at the information click

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All clinic volunteers must be licensed professionals.