L.A. Clinic Offers Care for Mayas/Karla Saia

Due in large part to tenacious outreach efforts, Los Angeles’ Clinica Romero is serving a growing Maya immigrant population, a group which has traditionally been relatively alienated from Western and institutionalized health care.

For the last eight years Idalia Xuncax, herself a Maya, has grown the clinic’s Maya clientele from a handful to approximately 700, and in doing so has brought preventive and routine care to a group leery of doctors. Further, she has learned to manage care for these immigrants – generally from Guatemala – in terms of other cultural and historical healing practices the community employs.

The clinic is receives funding from private donors, County, State and Federal Funds. As a result of the work by Ms. Xuncax and her colleagues, the Federal Government has agreed to fund the clinic’s healthcare research into Mayas in Los Angeles.

Link: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-mayan2apr02,1,7177882.story