What started as a partnership between a local church and a few volunteer doctors has now grown into a weekly medical clinic providing free healthcare to immigrant fishermen who dock in Honolulu Harbor.
This month marks 10 years of the volunteer-led Seafarers Medical Clinic, but the idea to help the harbor's fishermen started a few years earlier.
“There were some men who had not heard their name said to them in weeks, some who hadn't heard their language in years,” said Jerry Saludez, a pastor who was one of the first church members to establish the ministry at the harbor.
He and a few others from the Waipio Community Baptist Church first reached out to the fishermen in hopes of providing a spiritual safe haven. Saludez said many came from religious families and had not stepped inside a church in years.
Because of their immigration status, they cannot leave the dock's area without permission from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which means they can't leave for food, clothes, church or healthcare.
“So what's the saying? If they can't go to church, you bring church to them,” he said.
Saludez started asking the fishermen what they needed. Their answer? Home-cooked meals, prayers and new clothes.
But as Saludez got closer to the fishermen, they expressed their need for medical attention. The majority of them had healthcare that only covered emergency situations, meaning they did not have access to routine checkups, screenings, or prescription medication while they were away from their home countries.
“When I first came down to the pier, I thought, ‘Oh God, what did I get myself into?’” said Dr. Craig Nakatsuka, who was Saludez's primary care physician at the time.
From his first visit, Nakatsuka could tell he was in over his head with the number of fishermen who needed medical assistance, as roughly 150 fishing boats dock in the harbor. Many required diabetes medication, blood pressure tests and wound care from injuries during their fishing trips.
Nakatsuka asked a few of his colleagues to volunteer their time and extra resources to help him establish the clinic. Now, a decade later, it operates twice a week with about 40 student volunteers, 10 rotating physicians, and several interpreters for Filipino, Vietnamese, and Indonesian dialects.
“We don't know what kind of care they'll get when they go back to their home countries, and most of them come from very rural areas,” Nakatsuka said. “We're able to do a significant amount of preventive care that’ll last through decades of their life, and they won't succumb as early to some of their chronic or possibly catastrophic medical problems.”
Over the last 10 years, the clinic has treated more than 2,000 fishermen. They are employed on Hawaiʻi-based longline vessels and sell their fish at the Honolulu Fish Auction. Roughly 70-80% of the fish they catch stay in Hawaiʻi, going to hotels, restaurants and other retail establishments.
Mike Tran, a student volunteer and one of the Vietnamese interpreters, said he appreciates getting hands-on experience in the medical field, but also values how he has established relationships full of mutual trust and respect.
“Being able to bridge that gap past the language barrier has been special,” Tran said. “I'm speaking for them, so in a way I feel responsible for them. It’s just been really humbling and so fulfilling.”
Alex, a fisherman from the Philippines, said he was hesitant to seek help at first because of the way he had been treated by others in the past. But because he has diabetes, he eventually ran out of his prescribed medication and needed a refill. Four years later, he still goes to the clinic any time he's back between fishing trips.
“It’s very nice and very important that there's somebody. They have heart, they sacrifice their time to come here just to give us pre-checkup and medicine, so we are very glad,” Alex said.
Tran noted that many of the fishermen know that they are unwelcomed by some, so some have become more hesitant in asking for help. Alex said people see him as “one of those aliens.”
“They smoke, they drink, they have hypertension, and they have all the same diseases that people everywhere in the U.S. have,” Tran said. “We all get sick. They're not at all different from you or me.”
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