Putting Poor Women’s Health First

The first thing nurse practitioner Joan Magit gives her patients is a smile.

As a child, she pretended to take care of neighborhood kids. As an adult, Magit takes care of neighborhood women in the northeast San Fernando Valley.

The patients she sees at the Women’s Clinic in Pacoima are the uninsured working poor--waitresses, housekeepers and child-care workers--many of whom have never had a full gynecological exam even though most are mothers. The clinic, one of several sponsored by Pacoima-based MEND, or Meet Each Need With Dignity, is open two Tuesdays a month from 2-5 p.m.

Magit, a longtime MEND volunteer, has provided first-class medical services at the clinic for women over 40 since it opened last spring.

“The women give me a hug and thank me,” Magit said recently. “I’m always on a high. I love it. I wish I could do more.”

As a volunteer-based operation, MEND provides medical and dental checkups, clothing, emergency food and education to impoverished residents.

“If we didn’t have dedicated [people] like her,” said clinic manager Jenny Estupinian, “we couldn’t run the program. [Joan] likes helping people from the bottom of her heart.”

During a recent afternoon, the 60ish Magit saw only five patients because she took so much time with each. “You’re not going to have an impact that you really care about these women if you only see them for . . . five minutes,” she said.

After prescreenings by another practitioner, Magit gained her clients’ confidence by asking patients to talk about themselves. They talked about everything from their sexual histories to their eating habits.

The women remained clothed until the breast and pelvic exam. “That’s not my bag,” Magit said, referring to doctors who make patients sit in cold examining rooms wearing only paper gowns. “I wouldn’t want that done to me.”

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Spending nearly 45 minutes, Magit gave 48-year-old Robertina Perez a Pap smear, congratulated her on her recent 5-pound weight loss, gave her advice on how to tone her stomach and taught the mother of four techniques for breast self-examination. “That’s good,” Perez said. “The other clinic I went to didn’t teach me like this.”

Magit’s goal is to teach patients to take charge of their own health.

When Perez left, Magit pored over her file for at least 10 minutes. But, distracted by a visitor, Magit had forgotten to give the woman a referral for a mammogram. She quickly ran down the hall to catch her. But Perez was gone. Her file listed only an address, no phone number. Magit said she would drive the referral to Perez, who lives nearby.

“That’s what we are all about,” Magit said. “To not let things fall through the cracks.”

Magit said she would do whatever is needed to get her job done. Recently, she tossed out a glossy brochure on breast examination techniques and made her own cut-and-paste version to hand out to patients. The other one had too many words.

“A picture speaks a thousand words,” she said.

Magit knows she is helping women who would otherwise overlook their health.

“I only wish I could have a follow-up clinic where women could just come in and talk,” she said.

MEND, at 13460 Van Nuys Blvd., is supported through donations. Appointments must be made in advance; services are free. Call (818) 896-0246.

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