Maria Judith Alvarez, the founder and executive director of La Clinica del Pueblo, is a licensed doctor in Mexico but is not able to practice in the U.S. Regardless, she uses her expertise to push initiatives that address healthy living, particularly among community members with a lack of access to resources.
“Since I was a little girl, I was very interested in becoming a doctor,” Alvarez told The Sopris Sun. “I tell this story a lot, but I had a kitten who had gotten up on the roof, and it seemed like he had gotten into a fight. The kitten came home in the night bleeding from his foot … I put a bandage on him and then went to bed. When I woke up, the kitten had died overnight. I’m not sure if it was because he bled out, but from there my passion was born to want to help people.”
She also shared that she suffers from poliomyelitis, where one of her feet is shorter than the other. This causes her to limp when she walks.
Alvarez draws inspiration from both experiences to continue helping people obtain a healthier lifestyle, either through medical care or nutrition. For Alvarez, the decision to move from Mexico to the U.S. wasn’t an easy one, knowing she’d be going to a country where she didn’t know the language and having had an established career in Mexico.
“There are many in the [immigrant] community who have their professions but can’t work in the field they studied,” Alvarez said, noting that it’s not always feasible to repeat studies — especially when someone has a family to support. “You can’t give yourself the luxury of studying again.”
Alvarez founded La Clínica del Pueblo in 2016, after she saw through her work with Valley Settlement that immigrant women were not receiving adequate medical attention. After surveying patients she was working with (checking blood sugar, blood pressure and taking weights), it was clear that all of their levels were high. Because these patients had gone many years without seeing a doctor, Alvarez and her supervisor made it their mission to remedy that. They met a doctor from Nicaragua who was able to help provide those patients with medical care.
“The truth is, it was like a miracle,” stated Alvarez.
In 2020, Alvarez met Dr. Greg Feinsinger, who continues to help with Alvarez’s mission to bring equitable health care and access to the Valley. Dr. Feinsinger had his own organization, which later encompassed La Clínica del Pueblo. As his colleague, Alvarez helps interpret during medical visits with Dr. Feinsinger.
Alvarez considered how Mexico and the U.S. differ in terms of health care, and how that can impact many people’s perspectives.
“I believe that here [in the U.S.] we take a much more preventative focus,” Alvarez said. “Latinos go to the doctor because they are already in a lot of pain and have already tried all of the home remedies — or the ones from grandma — and they didn’t work, so they want something that will help.”
Often when “we go see the doctor and they don’t give us anything … [we ask], ‘Why did I go to the consultation?’” Alvarez pointed out. “I used to think that the preventative measure meant that the U.S. was too cautious in wanting to do analysis for everything in order to give you treatment, but the base is prevention.”
Alvarez went on to shed some light on a cultural aspect of the Latino community. Oftentimes, many in the Latino community prefer to either wait the pain out or take preventative measures into their own hands, due to high costs. While she understands the reasons for doing so, she argued that home remedies can also end up being costly and that the longer someone postpones a doctor visit, the more it will cost to address the ailment.
La Clinica del Pueblo offers free consultations, and additional fees are based on one’s ability to pay. Alvarez emphasized the importance of not only medicine, but diet and nutrition as essential to a healthier lifestyle. Aside from her work at La Clinica del Pueblo, Alvarez advocates healthy living through her cooking classes and her work with Safe and Abundant Nutrition Alliance (SANA), despite the barriers that hold her back from not being able to carry out her own medical practice in the U.S..
For more information on La Clinica del Pueblo, please visit tinyurl.com/LaClinicadelPueblo