Family Van

A pioneer in the growing trend in public health practice, mobile health clinic vans like the Family Van successfully reach people that typically do not or cannot access primary health care. When the Family Van was launched, on Martin Luther King Day, Jan. 15, 1992, the core focus was to provide preventative services to address health disparities in the Boston neighborhoods that had least access to prenatal care, and therefore high incidence rates of infant mortality and low birth weight. Over time the van’s mission has broadened to include disparities in stroke, hypertension, obesity, diabetes and cholesterolemia. While infant mortality remains a pressing issue, it is just one of the results of widespread lack of access to medical care and healthy living information in these communities. The van’s overall goal is to improve the health of these communities by encouraging people to take steps to prevent chronic disease and maintain good health.

To support this mission, the mobile clinic provides screening, testing and education in areas such as nutrition and weight management, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, pregnancy, contraception, sexually transmitted infection and other health risks. Today, as a program supported through Harvard Medical School, the Family Van is on the road each week and makes stops in six regular locations in Dorchester, Hyde Park, Mattapan and Roxbury. Recently, researchers used the Family Van to test a prototype “return on investment calculator” that can calculate the value of prevention services delivered by mobile health clinics and found that, for services provided in 2008, the van saved $36 in health care costs for ever dollar invested, for a total savings to the community of $20,339,968.

Another important function of the van is to provide medical, dental and allied health professions students with first-hand, practical experiences by coming aboard the van. The Family Van staff of health care professionals works with the medical education institutions to provide medical and allied health students with supervised rotations aboard the van to help inspire and train the next generation of family healthcare providers.