After providing health care in Haiti and Nicaragua, friends Tim Rogers and Harvey Rohlwing wanted to bring care to their own community.
The pair, a pharmacist and the president of Grace Healthcare Services Corp., started a free nonprofit pharmacy at Grace Marketplace together, which filled more than 5,000 prescriptions last year.
“I like to call it the pharmacy without a cash register,” Rogers said.
Open from 1-5 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays and from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturdays, the pharmacy operates solely on donations and volunteers.
Rogers volunteers at the Grace Healthcare Services Corp, which is funded through private donations and provides free prescription medicine and health care services to those without health insurance in Alachua County.
“I realized medicine is a real issue, and so many people with prescriptions can’t afford it, so what good does it do?” Rogers said.
Rogers sees about 25 patients per day, including those who live outside of Grace Marketplace.
Rogers and Rohlwing, a retired physician, spent years volunteering abroad on medical missions before they decided to open the pharmacy in 2017.
“We’re doing this in developing countries, so why can’t we do this sort of thing at home?” Rohlwing said.
Kimberly Atkinson, a 25-year-old third-year doctoral candidate, has seen the harsh reality of homelessness while volunteering.
“I truly feel like I’m helping somebody,” Atkinson said.
Grace Healthcare Services commonly provides blood thinners, antibiotics, psychiatric medication and more. However, Rogers said the pharmacy is in need of inhalers and seizure medications, which can be $15 to $20 each.
Rogers and Rohlwing hope to move to a larger building at Grace Marketplace.
“You can’t save the world, but you can make a little piece of it better for someone else,” Rogers said.
Contact Alyssa Ramos at aramos@alligator.org and follow her on Twitter at @LysKRamos
Dr. Fred West examines a patient, who complains of pain in the mouth after having his teeth removed, at an open wound clinic in Grace Marketplace on March 27.
