As a nurse in Texas, Janet Crumley was the person neighbors turned to for medical advice. Often these were Hispanic mothers with no access to affordable health care.
If her dream comes true, Crumley, who now lives in Marysville, soon will dispense medical advice to her new neighbors.
Crumley contacted me after I wrote about seeing a nurse practitioner for my yearly physical.
I should imagine not even being able to afford to see a nurse, she said.
Crumley received her nursing degree from Seattle University in 1975. She gave birth to a daughter between quarters.
“That was very clever of me,” she said.
She served in the U.S. Air Force and was stationed in San Antonio, Texas.
“I lived in an old, mostly Hispanic neighborhood,” Crumley said. “It was a very welcoming culture.”
She felt that helping the poor was her moral obligation.
“The women in the neighborhood were about my age and also had children. Many of them brought their health concerns to me, or asked me to take a look at their children.”
She was trusted as a mother and nurse, said Crumley, 63.
“They had no regular health care, and could not afford health care insurance,” she said. “That was nearly 30 years ago, and times have gotten much worse. I vowed at the time that I would, when given the opportunity, use my education to help others who had no access to health care.”
Crumley returned to the Northwest and raised her family as a single mother. She earned master’s degrees in nursing and divinity, did hospice nursing and now teaches online.
The nurse has her eye on property in her south Marysville neighborhood, where she would like to open a free clinic. She recently explained her idea to Marysville Mayor Dennis Kendall.
“I think that there is and always will be a need for free health clinics in our society,” Kendall said. “I feel that the major need is for the youth of our community, especially those that cannot afford medical insurance.”
In Crumley’s vision, folks would come to the walk-in clinic, which would be accessible to those with handicaps, and she would be able to do physical exams. She hopes a physician would volunteer his or her skills.
“I plan to offer educational classes for the community on a variety of health care issues,” Crumley said, “I want to teach people to be more responsible for their own health, and keep the ERs a little less busy.”
For instance, if a parent brought in a 5-year-old with sniffles, Crumley would be able to recommend the child sip tea with honey and lemon. She could steer parents to over-the-counter medication that would suit their child.
“Push fluids,” she said. “As a nurse I cannot diagnose, but I can sure say, ‘This looks like … and you need to see a doctor.’Â ”
She already knows someone who would volunteer as a Spanish translator.
Crumley is busy writing grants. It will still take money to run her free clinic, called Next Door Nurse.
For folks who are feeling fine, she hopes the clinic will be a place to relax, get a bowl of soup, play cards and put puzzles together.
“The dream is big,” she said.
Kristi O’Harran: 425-339-3451, oharran@heraldnet.com.
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