This Indianapolis church is also a clinic for the poor. Now it has even bigger plans.

Show Caption Hide Caption This church houses a free health clinic on the east side. Soon it will expand. Neighborhood Fellowship Church on the east side of Indianapolis hosts a free weekly health clinic. Now they plan to expand to a space across the street.

A doctor recently told Luis that he needed to have his blood tested. Without insurance, Luis would need to scrounge a few hundred dollars to pay.

Or, if he's like many uninsured Americans, maybe Luis would be forced to decline the care altogether, which for some patients can lead to worsening problems that eventually land them in an ambulance ride to an emergency room.

Instead, Luis found himself walking not into a traditional doctor's office or hospital but through the doors of Neighborhood Fellowship Church on the near east side. There, he exited the November cold of 10th Street and shuffled past a smiling pastor and into a church hall to set up an appointment in a small health clinic run by an army of medical students.

The students and their advisers come from Indiana University, Butler University and the University of Indianapolis. They are planning careers in medicine and nursing, social work and law, pharmacology and occupational or physical therapy.

"The best and the brightest are here, and the best and the brightest are coming up through here," said Jim Strietelmeier, a pastor at church.

For a decade, this clinic has provided hope and health care to thousands of people inside the church just east of Rural Street. But the volunteers and medical professionals behind the clinic are planning something even bigger.

The church has cheaply acquired 7,000 square feet of commercial space across the street and plans to transform the empty bays into a bustling clinic, cafe and art gallery that are open every day.

On that Saturday in November, Luis received the care he needed — no insurance required — just like the few dozen others who walked in.

Now clinic leaders are laying out a vision to help even more patients and neighbors like Luis.

But first, they are asking for financial support from the community.

'We are the poor'

It's a few minutes from the start of the clinic that Saturday when about 40 students, wearing their blue or red scrubs, filled in rows of church pews.

Strietelmeier stood beneath the morning glow filtering in through the sanctuary's stained glass windows while providing a little advice for the newcomers.

You may meet a few people, he explained, who have let their chronic conditions fester into acute problems.

But there's a reason.

They might not feel welcome elsewhere, the pastor said, because they have trouble navigating the medical system or they may have a warrant out for their arrest or maybe they just feel beaten down — by the community, by their own circumstances, by a lack of hope.

But the students gathered in this sanctuary? You're an answer to this church's prayers, Strietelmeier said.

He urged the students to show kindness for whoever walks through the door. Grow to know them, he said. Build friendships.

"The thing that you need to hear is that we don't have a currency here that isn't relationships," Strietelmeier said. "Most people have a little money, or they have education. All we have is relationships."

In an interview afterward, the pastor said the clinic is an obvious ministry for his church. It's not a form of giving back to the neighborhood, he said, because people of the neighborhood are the church.

"We don't minister to the poor," Strietelmeier said. "We are the poor. And we're just sharing what we know."

As for the students, Strietelmeier described how the students are positioned to respond to that message. They bring a "new heart" to the challenges confronting the neighborhood, he said, such as displaying a commitment to treating addiction when everyone else has given up.

Transforming into a clinic

The church seamlessly transforms into the clinic.

One room of the church serves as a waiting room, lined with blue cloth chairs and a table displaying a spread of doughnuts and coffee.

Throughout the morning, nursing students breeze past each other carrying clipboards, Macbook laptops or folders. They crouch next to sitting patients to gauge their needs before ushering them past a wide whiteboard to the right destinations.

Weight scales and hand sanitizer stations stand next to children's drawings and small tables in a Sunday school classroom.

Four closet-sized rooms contain medical exam tables for primary care.

In the next room over, a handful of pharmacy students sit behind a long table to fill most common prescriptions. (No painkillers though, stressed the pastor who keeps a dose of Narcan in his church office.)

On this day, the pharmacy students brought flu shots. Some weeks include clinics for dental, eyes or women's health.

As Strietelmeier and others look to the future, though, they see what could lie ahead in an expanded space across the street.

'Medical education at its best'

The footsteps of Dr. Javier Sevilla crunch through the dirt and gravel ground as he sweeps through the empty commercial space in the Clifford Corners building.

Sevilla, who serves as the medical director, helped launch the clinic alongside the church about 10 years ago. It was the second clinic he founded, following one he created in his native Honduras.

"My interests have always been serving the under-served," said Sevilla, who also is an IU Health physician.

As he eyes the empty space across from the church, Sevilla is beaming.

He points toward the west end of the building. All of that openness would become exam rooms for physical therapy and occupational therapy. Right now, patients must walk up flights of stairs to the only available area inside the church.

New rooms also would be built for a pharmacy, nursing station and lab. New suites would be available for eye and dental care.

"It's a beautiful place," Sevilla said. "It would do so much good to the community."

The Clifford Corners building, which also includes some condos and apartments upstairs, popped up a few years ago as part of an effort to spur retail and other economic development along East 10th Street.

Those plans came to the area a little early, Strietelmeier said, and the commercial space sat vacant for years.

The East Tenth Street Civic Association has since provided the space to Neighborhood Fellowship Church at a steep discount, he said.

The expansion would not just help the community, Sevilla said. It would also benefit the students.

"We do train them for the first two years in basic science and clinical sciences. When they come, they practice what they have learned," Sevilla said." And they do basically have an extension what they already are doing in our hospitals."

All of the clinic's partners, Sevilla said, are ready to support an expansion. And the students are as eager as anyone to snap up volunteer hours in the clinic.

"This is medical education at its best," Sevilla said.

How to help

On that Saturday in November, Luis was joined by his wife, Claudia, who needed a preventative check-up.

"It's their first time coming here," said Stephanie Munoz, a nursing student who translated an IndyStar interview for the two, who speak Spanish. "They feel like there's a little bit of a delay in the process, but our attention that we give is great."

The thought of being able to provide care to even more people makes Sevilla smile.

"When somebody comes, what we want them to know is that we are open for the poor, for the under-served and we are interested in serving the uninsured, the under-insured and working poor families who can't afford to have any type of insurance," Sevilla said.

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To fund the expansion, the clinic will need $2 million.

Strietelmeier and Sevilla will rely on bigger donors — such as major employers and foundations and philanthropists — to hopefully pick up the bulk of the costs.

For $500,000, though, they are looking to the community to chip in through an online fundraiser at www.todahgive.com.

"Every penny we give," Sevilla said, "goes directly to the community."

Contact IndyStar reporter Ryan Martin at 317-444-6294 or ryan.martin@indystar.com. Follow him on Facebook or Twitter: @ryanmartin

Contact IndyStar visual journalist Jenna Watson at jenna.watson@indystar.com