When John Lund, a diabetic, worked as a driver for a small construction-equipment company five years ago, the insulin he needed was covered by his health care insurance policy.
Then, as he was delivering some equipment to a construction site, his blood sugar plummeted. His driving became erratic. Lund lost his job. The liability risk presented by a diabetic driver, his boss told him, was too high.
Without health insurance, Lund suddenly was paying $100 for a bottle of insulin — and he went through two to three bottles of insulin a month. Physician visits were out of reach.
Then he learned about Denver’s Inner City Health Center, a private, nonprofit, volunteer-based clinic that provides medical and dental care to the poor and uninsured. It is among the organizations applying for funds from this year’s Season to Share campaign.
Thanks to financial donations, the Inner City Health Center can supplement the price of a vial of insulin to bring the price down to about $10 — a cost that Lund and other diabetic patients can manage.
Like Lund, more than two-thirds of Inner City Health Center’s patients qualify as members of the working poor — low-wage earners whose income falls 150 percent below federal poverty guidelines, says chief executive Kraig Burleson.
“Most of our patients are people who work hard every day but don’t make enough to afford health insurance,” he said.
By becoming an Inner City Health Center patient, Lund can get a sharply reduced price on insulin and prescription drugs.
Not only were physician visits more affordable — Inner City Health Center patients are charged on a sliding scale proportionate to their income — but Lund was assigned permanently to one doctor.
He sees that doctor on every visit instead of being shunted from one on-duty physician to another, as many private health-care insurance policy-holders are forced to do.
“We try not to say ‘no’ to anyone,” Burleson said. More than 45 percent of the center’s patients live outside the city and county of Denver. Lund lives in Thornton.
“The only limitations to accessing Inner City Health Center’s care is our capacity to provide it.”
