 | Overview
Houston Outreach Medicine, Education, and Social Services (or H.O.M.E.S.) is a multi-institutional, multi-disciplinary student-run free clinic for the homeless of Houston. H.O.M.E.S. is an innovative and exciting new program in which the major higher educational institutions of Houston collaborate with community organizations to provide quality, accessible healthcare and social services to the homeless, as well as provide a unique learning experience for students from a variety of different disciplines. More than 200 students work together from the medical schools of Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) and The University of Texas - Houston Health Science Center (UT-H) as well as from the The University of Texas - Houston School of Public Health and University of Houston College of Pharmacy. The unique three-part learning experience includes social, professional, and personal aspects. Before the clinic opens, the students share coffee and tea with homeless individuals at a local church. This provides students with the opportunity to build relationships with a community that on the whole has been shunned by the general population. During the operation of the clinic, students work in a multi-disciplinary system with public health, medical, and pharmacy students working together to provide a wide breadth of care, support, and services to the patients. Finally, after the clinic is closed, students are involved in a reflection period to discuss the students' experiences, impressions, and thoughts of their day and how these have impacted their view of the homeless population, healthcare, and themselves as providers. History In February of 1999, a group of ten medical students from Baylor College of Medicine and five medical students from the University of Texas at Houston wanted to supplement existing health care services for the homeless of Houston. Dr. David S. Buck, Department of Family and Community Medicine at BCM and Medical Director of Baylor/SEARCH Clinic, a medical clinic for the homeless, became the faculty advisor for the group and supported the development of this community oriented primary care project. When the H.O.M.E.S. Clinic was in its planning stages, consumers with the experience of homelessness, representatives of agencies serving the homeless, potential preceptors, students and Dr. Buck joined to form action committees, with each committee consisting of at least one consumer. During the following months, these committees invited schools of different disciplines to participate, wrote a mission statement and created the novel framework for what would become known as the H.O.M.E.S. Clinic. Sunday was the day chosen for the clinic, because a situational needs assessment conducted that year showed that there was no medical care available to the homeless on Sundays other than the Emergency Room. The H.O.M.E.S. Clinic opened at its original location, the Lord of the Streets (L.O.T.S.), a facility for the homeless that included the Caritas Health Care Clinic on Sunday, January 16th, 2000. Then, on April 22nd, 2007 the clinic officially completed a move to a new location, the Cathedral Clinic at Christ Church Cathedral. The new facility has two complete exam rooms, two satellite exam rooms, a pharmacy, and several counseling rooms. Since its inception the HOMES Clinic has involved hundreds of volunteers and served over a thousand patients.
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