On Monroe County roads usually reserved for tractors, pickups and Amish buggies, a different kind of vehicle ambles through the rolling hills.
 
Physicians and residents from the Gundersen Region of Bellin and Gundersen Health System Health System ride with La Crosse’s St. Clare Health Mission to provide care at local farms with St. Clare’s Rotary Mobile Clinic, a full-scale, full-service family medicine unit.
 
Two Fridays each month – dubbed Fridays at the Farm – the team makes stops at farms that employ a predominantly migrant workforce.
 
The team provides acute care and disease management services. They also handle the unexpected injuries that occur while working on a farm. Many patients they see mostly use local hospitals or clinics for emergency care. The team wants to treat conditions early so trips to the emergency room are avoided.
 
“We’re getting to know a lot of people gradually,” shares Sarah Brown, MD, the attending Gundersen physician and program coordinator. “We try to keep people connected to health systems or build a bridge back to healthcare, if possible.”
 
For second-year resident Kate Edsall, MD, rounds at the farm allow her to get to know people in the community who she wouldn’t otherwise see.
 
“This is a part of our community, but when we stay in the walls of our clinic, we don’t always see all of that,” Dr. Edsall says. “Bringing care to people and helping to break down some of those barriers is a really neat opportunity and what we should be doing if we want to have healthy communities.”
 
“We view healthcare as a basic human right,” Dr. Brown says. “Our hope is also that caring for people with regularity can help prevent complications from diseases long term, prevent overutilization of emergency services and even reduce hospitalization rates.”