Paul Hutchton, M.D. and clinic manager Betty Gallegos inside the OBGYN exam room in the new RotoCare primary health clinic at 301 Schutz in El Paso's Lower Valley. (Rudy GutierrezEl Paso Times )

Looking for a signature project to celebrate the Rotary Club of El Paso's 100th anniversary, the organization recently opened the RotaCare Clinic in the Lower Valley.

"About 25 to 30 years ago, there were some doctors in California and Rotarions who set up a number of clinics in the Bay Area," said Greg Hartley, a Rotary Club of El Paso member.

"There's a couple in Oregon, and a couple in Washington State that were established in order to help the indigent and the under-insured and the working poor to get basic health care needs. We used their model and brought it back to El Paso."

The RotaCare Clinic at 301 S. Schutz St., in Ysleta neighborhood, is the first in Texas. It opened Sept. 13 and will be open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. every other Saturday starting Oct. 11.

Stacy Nguy, center, a fist year medical student at the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine and Cecyl Casta on, a freshman medical biology student at UTEP take inventory of medical supplies in a storeroom at the RotaCare Clinic at 301 S. Schutz Saturday. The volunteers were helping get the primary care clinic going. The Rotary Clubs of El Paso is helping to fund the clinic, which will be staffed by Texas Tech. It will start seeing patients Oct. 11. (Rudy GutierrezEl Paso Times )

RotaCare is a volunteer alliance of medical professionals, organizations and community members dedicated to providing free primary, quality healthcare services to uninsured families and individuals with limited ability to pay for medical care.

The clinic is staffed by resident physicians from the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in El Paso.

"The clinic is open and free to anyone who needs help," Hartley said. "We're trying to get them basic health care and trying to get them into the health care system."

Dr. Richard McCallum, a professor and founding chairman of the Department of Internal Medicine at the medical school, serves the clinic's medical director.

Read more:

El Paso Rotary Club celebrates centennial with health care clinic