By Shern-Min Chow / 11 News
When this Southwest Houston clinic first opened, it had just two rooms, a paid core staff and dozens of volunteers, including specialty physicians servicing the low income and uninsured in its multi-ethnic neighborhood.
Fifty one thousand patients later, they moved into a new facility six months ago. Down the hall? Vision and dental care.
“I’m a student. I’m not insured. At $25 you can’t beat it,” said Mohammad Alam, 22, who is a regular customer at the clinic. “They are in Dubai in the Middle East, where I was born and I found one here.
“I was like ‘score,’ cheap health care.”
The Ibn Sina Community Medical Center opened in 2001 just after Sept. 11.
It was in part the brainchild of Dr. Dilawar Ajani. Plans were already underway but, “In terms of offering our services, it gave us the opportunity to work more vigorously.”
The Ibn Sina foundation was created by the local Ismaili community. Ismaili’s are a minority branch of Islam.
Not lost on anyone? Fear of Muslim charities accused of funding terrorism abroad. In Dallas, closing arguments continue today in just such a case; the so called “Holy land trial.”
Ibn Sina boasts its financial books are open to anyone.
Those donations are used in a neighborhood, where 40 percent of the residents live below the poverty line.
At the clinic, 70-percent of the patients are Southeast Asian, about 30-percent are black and Hispanic. The non-Southeast Asians started coming because of Hurricane Katrina.
Those families will also be eligible to attend Ibn Sina’s new Montessori school that is scheduled to open next year. Like the clinic, its funded by the Ibn Sina’ seed money and other grants.
Last year, their international group purchased 11.2 acres of real estate on Allen Parkway in the shadow of downtown Houston. It will eventually become the first Ismaili center in the U.S. and operate in practice as its headquarters.
Ismailimail 