Healing the Homeless

A sidewalk might be a strange setting for an epiphany, but that's exactly where Roseanna Means, M.D., had hers. Every morning on her way to work as an internist at Massachusetts General Hospital, she walked by homeless people huddled on the concrete. One cold day the irony of the situation struck her—there in front of one of the country's most renowned hospitals were people not getting any medical attention. Here I am doing my job, she thought, but I'm not helping the people who need it the most.

Roseanna left MGH to work for Boston Health Care for the Homeless. Even in those clinics she noticed that women, the fastest-growing homeless population, often didn't use the services provided. She asked them why. They were afraid. Ashamed. Mostly, though, they avoided the system because the care wasn't connected to the reality of their lives on the street. Not only did they lack insurance, they had no address where test results could be sent, no phone number a doctor could call to follow up, no transportation to appointments.

If these women can't come to me, I'll go to them, Roseanna decided. In 1999 she left her job and with a $7,500 grant from her church, launched Women of Means to bring free medical care directly to homeless women and their children. "I see them on their turf-—shelters, soup kitchens, drop-in centers. They don't have to tell me anything to get treated—not their name, their date of birth." Still, it was tough to get the women to trust her and to get funding to pay for medicine and supplies. "Many nights I asked God, 'You put me on this path. Where am I going?'"

Slowly, by giving the care that homeless women don't get elsewhere, like toenail cutting, Roseanna built trust. And she built a team of medical volunteers who now provide 5,000 free patient visits each year. "It's been a huge faith journey for me," Roseanna says.

Where is she going? Wherever the most vulnerable among us are.