{"id":133632,"date":"2023-02-06T14:39:24","date_gmt":"2023-02-06T19:39:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/?p=133632"},"modified":"2023-02-10T14:32:04","modified_gmt":"2023-02-10T19:32:04","slug":"ucf-medicine-alum-nemours-director-starts-pediatric-mobile-clinic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/ucf-medicine-alum-nemours-director-starts-pediatric-mobile-clinic\/","title":{"rendered":"UCF Medicine Alum, Nemours Director Starts Pediatric Mobile Clinic"},"content":{"rendered":"

On this Saturday morning, more than a dozen uninsured children are getting their health checks and vaccinations through the Nemours Children\u2019s Health Mobile Clinic \u2014 thanks to a College of Medicine-trained physician who has spent her career advocating for others.<\/p>\n

Laura Chilcutt ’19MD<\/strong> graduated from UCF\u2019s medical school<\/a> in 2019 and was one of the first physician Knights to join Nemours in Lake Nona for her pediatric residency training. Today, she is on staff at the hospital and is medical director of the clinic \u2014 a van that provides care once a month at three Orlando locations for children in need.<\/p>\n

Chilcutt created the effort after learning of an unused van at a Nemours hospital in Delaware. With help from a $25,000 grand from TD Bank, she began providing services such as check-ups and vaccinations out of the van. Now she has expanded the effort, arranging office space at the Mexican Consulate, Hope Community Center and the Hispanic Federation in Orlando so children and their families don\u2019t have to wait outside in the heat and rain. She has also gotten UCF medical students to volunteer at the clinic, giving them the opportunity to practice their clinical skills while serving the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cNemours Children\u2019s Health\u2019s Mobile Clinic is one way that Nemours is addressing health outside the walls of our hospital to bring high quality care to some of the most vulnerable children in our communities,\u201d says Daniel Podberesky, the hospital\u2019s chief medical offer and a professor at the College of Medicine.<\/p>\n

At the recent clinic at the Hispanic Federation on Orlando\u2019s Sand Lake Road, Chilcutt\u2019s team prepared vaccinations for measles, mumps, rubella, polio and meningitis in the van while medical students registered patients and took their vital signs in makeshift exam rooms on the office\u2019s third floor.<\/p>\n

Carolyn Rapp, a third-year UCF medical student, placed a blood pressure cuff on the arm of a girl who was visiting the clinic with her mother and sister. She recorded the child\u2019s heart rate, height and weight and then sent her to the next room for a vision check. Rapp is one of six M.D. students who regularly volunteers with the Nemours effort. She became involved after learning how the clinic was providing care and education to children with asthma and their families.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the kids,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re so sweet and a lot of them are Spanish-speaking so it\u2019s a great way for me to practice my Spanish and get to know the community.\u201d<\/p>\n