Spring Valley, NY – A health center for the poor that was closed nearly two months ago because of unsanitary conditions reopened yesterday.
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Patients were told yesterday that they could start seeing doctors again at the Ben Gilman Medical and Dental Clinic at 175 Route 59. A free community health screening and media tour of the facility will also be offered in two weeks.
The center was ordered shut at the end of May after patients complained to authorities that the building had an overpowering stench and was filled with bird excrement and live and dead animals. The smell was powerful enough that employees were wearing surgical masks in order to breathe.
Municipal and health officials found conditions inside the building so dangerous that it was ordered shut immediately. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration said it has issued citations to the center.
The Ben Gilman Clinic is a satellite center of Community Medical and Dental Care Inc. of Monsey, a large health center on Robert Pitt Drive headed by Mendel Hoffman.
Community Medical and Dental received $6.8 million in government funding – the bulk of its $7.3 million budget – in 2006, the most recent tax filing on record for the group, according to documents.
A spokesman for Hoffman has blamed the landlord for the problems at the center, even though no other buildings in the strip shopping center where it is situated had similar conditions.
Patients saw doctors at the Monsey center after the Spring Valley site was ordered shut.
Patients and workers were seen going in an out of the Spring Valley building yesterday afternoon.
Michele Regis, a Nanuet resident, had been going to the Gilman clinic, but when she called for an appointment about a month ago she was told it was closed. Regis was told that she could see a doctor at Community Medical and Dental instead.
But when she showed up at the Monsey site for her appointment yesterday, she was told that the Spring Valley clinic had reopened and she could see her doctor there.
Regis said she was satisfied with the care that she received yesterday. But she had noticed on earlier visits that the health center was not very clean or well-organized.
The Gilman center was allowed to reopen yesterday after inspections by the state Department of Health.
An inspection June 30, more than a month after the Spring Valley building inspector ordered it closed, revealed additional problems.
Records show that inspectors found a container with hazardous material, including human discards, stored on top of a microwave oven used to prepare food.
Inspectors also found that two boxes of medical records were stored in a janitor’s closet in the obstetrical and gynecological area and examination chairs were ripped, among other problems.
In a letter from Hoffman to the state dated July 10, he said all 14 health code violations cited by the state had been corrected and asked for permission to reopen.
“I trust that the actions we have taken will result in a decision in our favor and we will receive a green light to resume operations in our Spring Valley clinic,” Hoffman wrote in the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Journal News under the Freedom of Information Act.
The state Department of Health has cited the Gilman clinic in the past. A 2005 inspection revealed dirty conditions, including dried blood on a countertop, surgical instruments improperly sterilized, stained and sagging ceiling tiles, and medications improperly stored, according to state records.
The clinic in the past has had a tense relationship with the community it serves. Community leaders have maintained that the center’s predominately black and Hispanic patients are treated rudely by the staff – a claim that clinic operators have denied.
Two years ago, the Spring Valley branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People filed a human rights complaint against the center, claiming that it discriminated by closing on Saturdays to accommodate the Jewish Sabbath.
The complaint was dismissed. NAACP officials met with Hoffman, who agreed to consider opening the center Saturdays, after the Sabbath.
“Two years ago, the Spring Valley branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People filed a human rights complaint against the center, claiming that it discriminated by closing on Saturdays to accommodate the Jewish Sabbath.”
these racists (like the moslems) believe that everything is a zero-sum game. .
pathetic
“Two years ago, the Spring Valley branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People filed a human rights complaint against the center, claiming that it discriminated by closing on Saturdays to accommodate the Jewish Sabbath.”
Perhaps instead of suing a center founded, organized, and originally funded by Jews that serves the Black and Hispanic population 6 days a week, maybe open your own center you anti-semitic bastards.