With tables out on the lawn at Sony Pictures Entertainment and art for auction, the party to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Westside Family Health Center on October 10, 2024 was a victory lap for an organization that has been a gift to the community.
Starting in 1974 as a volunteer-run women’s health clinic, the WFHC now provides 34,194 primary care visits annually to over 12,300 women, men and children.
In April 2020, after 46 years in its original home in Santa Monica, WFHC fulfilled a longtime dream with the opening of its state-of-the-art clinic and headquarters in Culver City. The vision of WFHC’s new home included the expansion of mental health services, the addition of oral health, and vision care.
President Deb Farmer spoke to the gathering, addressing how the clinic had evolved from caring for women, to caring for women and children, to including teens, adults and the entire family. “When you offer health services, it’s a continual expansion as you see patients whose need for care inspires the ability to provide what is needed.”
Yheisi Alfaro, a member of the Community Board at the clinic, confided how excellent the quality of the support was that she and her family had received from WFHC, and how much they had benefitted as a result. “When it was just one challenge after another, I had nowhere else to turn…and having the continuity of care made such a difference.”
It was also an evening of donors, doctors and clinic staff bidding on artworks and vacation weekends to raise funds for the clinic. Curtis Degenfelder of the Board of Directors noted that staying up to date with tech was at least as crucial to good health care as having excellent staff. “That,” he noted, “can be expensive.”
Farmer was effusive in her thanks to all who had been with the clinic through the decades of effort and expansion. “It’s not just me up here, you all know who you are, and it would not have happened without you.”
With the continuing success of the Culver City clinic, WFHC can enjoy that well earned victory lap.
Judith Martin-Straw