Tour the Kansas City CARE Clinic

Description: Volunteer dentists provide vital services to our patient base. We have been fortunate to develop a close relationship with the School of Dentistry at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, and many of their technicians gain valuable training at our Eastside (Prospect) location.

Description: Though we still rely on local medical providers to donate office furnishings and medical supplies, the Clinic’s exam rooms and patient areas are kept fully stocked and up-to-date.

Description: The Kansas City Free Health Clinic – open since 1971, we promote health and wellness by providing quality services, at no charge, to people without access to basic care.

Description: While the surroundings were not high-tech, the Clinic’s founders operated with a passion for their patients that continues to be the backbone of our care today.

Description: In early days, Clinic services focused on family planning, counseling and drug abuse treatment, and venereal disease screening, lab testing, treatment and follow up. There were up to four co-administrators at a time who drew salary from what (if anything) was left after the bills were paid. Beyond those four co-administrators, all work was done by volunteers.

Description: Staffed almost entirely by volunteers and stocked with cast-offs from other local medical providers, the waiting room and patient areas of the Clinic were rudimentary in the early days of our history.

Description: The Clinic first opened on April 5, 1971 in the lobby of the Alcazar Hotel at 39th and Baltimore in downtown Kansas City. The next year, the Clinic moved to this “old stone house” a short distance away.

Description: Written out at an early meeting, the formative vision statement of the Clinic was: “We believe that health care is a human right, not a privilege based on income or anything else; that health care means caring about people, not just treating their diseases; that an emphasis on health education, preventive medicine, demystification and de-professionalism of medicine must underlie all interactions between staff and patients; that no hierarchical structures can exist among clinic staff or between staff and patients. We see the Free Clinic as a tool to build a new community.” This vision statement still hangs on the wall in today’s Kansas City Free Health Clinic.

Description: Phlebotomy services are one of the many areas of patient care available at the Kansas City Free Health Clinic.

Description: In 2011 the Clinic opened a satellite location at 6400 Prospect. This space houses our dental services programs.

Description: An early t-shirt promoting the Clinic; in 2011 we celebrated our 40th anniversary of creating solutions for a healthy community. We thank our patients, care providers and partners for sharing in our mission, and look forward to our next 40 years of keeping Kansas City healthy!

Description: In addition to a roster of physicians, patients are also assisted by a network of volunteer medical students who earn their clinical rotation hours through service at the Clinic. We are proud to train the next generation of Kansas City’s medical providers!

Description: The Kansas City Free Health Clinic now occupies all three floors of this building at 3515 Broadway, in the heart of Kansas City’s Midtown district. Though the Clinic has grown, volunteerism and a commitment to the full spectrum of patient care has not changed since our founding 40 years ago. In 2011 we scheduled over 41,000 appointments with only one full-time medical director on staff!

Description: The patient waiting room at the Kansas City Free Health Clinic.