FAIRHOPE, Alabama—After an accident with a drunk driver left a local man paralyzed from the neck down, he was turned away by all nearby medical facilities for badly needed follow-up treatment.

But the day he showed up at the Hope Center, his life turned around.

“He had no insurance and no one would take him,” said Dr. Lynne Kirkland, a family practice physician who volunteers at the center, a medical clinic founded by the Church on the Eastern Shore. “Every place he sought help turned him away.”

Since opening its doors in February 2010, the Hope Center has provided low-cost medical, dental and counseling services to more than 2,300 patients, which are donated by volunteer medical staff like Kirkland.

“The man came to us to in a wheelchair with only a catheter connected and sheet draped over him,” said Dana Smith, a registered nurse who is administrative director of the center. “I had no idea what we could do to help him. But Dr. Lynne said, ‘We’ve got to see him. That’s what we’re here for.’”

Kirkland became the primary care doctor for that badly injured man, who had faced only closed doors until finding his way to the Hope Center. With her help and the assistance of a physical therapist recruited by Smith—who came on lunch hours to treat the quadriplegic patient—something unexpected happened.

“After several months, he progressed much more than any of us ever thought possible,” Smith said. “One day he showed up using only a walker. He truly got his life back.”

Located next to the Church on the Eastern Shore in Fairhope, the center integrates medical treatment with religious services, prayer and counseling and was created to meet unmet needs in the community, said Russell Creel, the church’s discipleship pastor.

“It was birthed out of the vision of the church with the goal of not just identifying needs but doing something about them,” Creel said. “One of the most tremendous needs we found were those medical ones faced by people with no insurance, maybe after losing a job.”

As one of more than a dozen volunteer physicians, dentists, nurses and staff at the center, Kirkland’s work there serves a higher calling, Smith said.

“All of our doctors and medical volunteers have a heart for people and love the Lord,” Smith said. “They come in here and really just want to serve people. Dr. Lynne is one of those doctors that no matter what their patient is going through, she can connect with them. That’s one of the most wonderful things about her. It’s more than work for her; it’s a ministry.”

A Mobile native, Kirkland now lives in Fairhope with husband Chuck and their two boys, Kirk and John Will. Following a degree in biology from Rhodes College in Memphis, she graduated in 1996 from medical school at the University of South Alabama, on an educational path that began much earlier.

“In seventh-grade biology I learned about the gastrointestinal system,” she said, smiling. “I thought that was one of the coolest things in the world.”

After completing a family and community medicine residency at USA in 1999, she helped found Daphne Family Practice a few years later.

“Once I became a Christian, my work became a ministry and not just a job,” Kirkland said.

She then began looking for the kind of volunteer work that would fit with the ministry aspects of her medical practice.

“I was looking for that volunteer opportunity that was faith-based,” she said. “It had to be the right place. The Hope Center has been a perfect match.”

Kirkland has volunteered at the center going on two years, providing her time, knowledge and medical services there every month.

“I see anyone who walks in the door,” she said. “We see a lot of patients with diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol problems. My practice focuses on taking care of the whole family, and that dynamic is what I enjoy most.”

On a recent Monday afternoon, half a dozen patients sat in the center’s waiting room, while volunteer medical staff came and went from examination rooms.

“Many of our patients who are without insurance many not have seen a doctor or dentist in years,” Smith said between phone calls and staff meetings. “We’re able to reach out to them and give them medical care that is affordable and makes a crucial difference in their lives.”

Across town, Kirkland worked in her Daphne office, reflecting on that one patient who had been turned away from the door of every other medical facility in the area.

‘I will never forget the day he came to the Hope Center with a walker,” Kirkland said.

While leaning on his walker and with the help of a Spanish translator, she said he told them, “When I first came here, I had the feeling this was the place where they give you hope.”

Kirkland said those kinds of moments and results are examples of the good works done by the Hope Center and its volunteers.

“It was very humbling to know how many people’s efforts at the agency were involved in having that kind of impact,” she said. “One of the things that has always impressed me is that people are doing good there and not just talking about it. I feel everyone at the Hope Center is truly walking the walk.”

For more information, visit the Hope Center's website at www.hopecenter.tv or call 251-445-2273.