Mobile Health Van to Provide Medical Services at Senior/Teen Center

Bethel residents, according to a sliding scale, will be able to take advantage of low cost or free medical services via a mobile medical van that will travel from Danbury to Bethel. The van will provide most of the services one would expect to find in a doctor's office.

 According to information from the Greater Danbury Community Health Center, “The Mobile Health Van will offer work, sports, and school physicals, sick visits, immunizations, TB testing and many other health services.”

 The Mobile Health Van has been operating in Danbury through the and became a model of the services that will now be provided to Bethel, Danbury, Brookfield, Newtown, Ridgefield, and other towns in Western CT.

 Medical services will be offered in Bethel on Wednesday mornings at the . “This moves the front door of the Health Center from Downtown Danbury to every town and neighborhood that the mobile van will visit,” said James Maloney, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Connecticut Institute for Communities, Inc. 

Maloney was joined by First Selectman Matt Knickerbocker and Congressman Chris Murphy in the Senior Center Wednesday afternoon to announce the van's presence in Bethel. “The Mobile Health Van will substantially expand access to affordable health care in the region,” Murphy said.

 The van was financed by federal funds and the provided a grant for start-up funds, according to the congressman.

 “The van is a game changer that will bring a lot more access to health care,” Maloney said.

 Knickerbocker said, “Even for one day a week, this will make a tremendous difference in our community. We are still struggling through a weak economy, and we still have people in our communities that have lost their jobs and access to transportation.”

 Murphy called the van “a brick in the increasingly solid wall” of local health care. “We need to bring health care to where people are,” he said. “We will be finding people before their condition becomes critical or crisis care. It's good for people but it is also good for taxpayers,” Murphy said.