Baylor grad launches ministry to provide health care to Amarillo’s underserved

All kinds of people come to Heal The City in Amarillo, Texas: A mother who brought her son because she couldn’t afford the shots needed to keep him in school. A woman with arthritis and nerve damage who waited nearly two hours in the cold for the doors to open. A man who came shortly after Heal The City opened in 2014, which proved to be just in time to discover a tumor that threatened to take his vision. None of them had insurance; all of them got the care they needed.

Heal The City was founded by a Baylor biology graduate, Dr. Alan Keister, BA ’92, after he recognized the need for a medical mission that provided free urgent medical care, prescriptions and more to the poor and uninsured in his city. The patients who come can’t afford care elsewhere. At Heal The City, they receive not only medical attention, but compassion and dignity from a team of volunteer professionals that desires to share Christ’s love and hope through their service.

Five years ago, Keister returned home to Amarillo full of joy following one of his annual medical missions trips to Honduras. But he also had a nagging feeling that serving the downtrodden wasn’t something to be packed away until next year each time his plane left Honduras to return to Texas. “Isn’t there supposed to be more than this?” he asked himself.

Keister looked for ways to serve closer to home, providing occasional free health screenings. That eventually led to the idea of a free health clinic, which he and dozens of volunteers were able to turn into a reality. Now, a line of people needing care begins forming well before the doors open each Monday. After a full day of work in his regular practice, Keister arrives every afternoon or evening and, along with other medical volunteers, begins seeing dozens of patients.

As of last fall, the ministry had served more than 2,200 patients. They’re currently open on Mondays only, but plans are in the works for expansion. That expansion includes a 20,000-square-foot facility purchased for them by a donor. They’ll move to the much larger building later this year, where they’ll be able to treat even more patients and provide expanded diabetes and obesity services, which are chronic conditions for many low-income individuals.

Sic ’em, Heal The City and Dr. Alan Keister!