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Our Services | Lottery | Eligibilty & Guidelines
OUR SERVICES
The RI Free Clinic provides comprehensive healthcare and wellness services to its patients, who never see a bill for any service provided.
We provide primary care, including physicals, X-rays, lab tests and screenings, prescriptions, and treat acute and chronic medical conditions through a range of specialty services provided by our provider-based volunteer network structure. Services provided include:
- Behavioral Health
- Cardiology
- Chiropractic Care
- Dermatology
- Diabetes Management/Education
- Endocrinology
- Gastroenterology
- Gynecology
- Men’s Health
- Neurology – Neurosurgery
- Ophthalmology/Optometry
- Orthopedics
- Pharmacy/Patient Assistant Programs
- Pre-Employment Physicals
- Psychiatry/Psychology
- Pulmonology
- Podiatry
- Women’s Cancer Screening
- Women’s Health
We also provide a range of wellness and behavioral health services:
- Cooking Classes
- Diabetes Management/Education
- Exercise Classes, including Cardio, Walking Yoga and others
- Mental Health Counseling
- Nutrition Counseling
- Yoga
Clinical testing – laboratory tests, X-Ray and diagnostic services – are provided by Lifespan, our largest community partner for more than a decade. These services are provided by more than 30 clinics, most of which are at RI Hospital.
WORKPLACE HEALTH SCREENINGS
The RI Free Clinic is a key partner in supporting workforce development by providing pre-employment and pre-school physicals, enabling employment and training opportunities so residents can advance and improve their lives.
To become a patient at the RI Free Clinic you must be a RI resident, 18 or older, who lacks employer-provided health insurance or who cannot afford to purchase those services on your own.
Becoming a patient at the RI Free Clinic is a three-step process:
- You must attend a monthly lottery for new patients
- Have your ticket chosen at the lottery
- You must meet our eligibility requirements
WHY A LOTTERY AND HOW DOES IT WORK?
Because demand for our services is greater than our current capacity to service all who seek our help, we are limited in the number of patients we can accept each month. After consulting with other free healthcare provider organizations across the country, we decided to employ a lottery by ticket number as the fairest way to select new patients.
The RI Free Clinic selects new patients each month via a lottery process. The lottery is held at the Clinic located at 655 Broad Street in Providence on the first Thursday of each month, beginning at 4:00pm.
Watch our video on how to become a patient at the RI Free Clinic. The video explains the lottery process and the eligibility guidelines and will help prepare you before you come to the lottery. Click to view.
If your English is limited, it may be helpful for you to bring a relative, friend or co-worker with you who speaks English. We do have translators on hand but cannot guarantee that we will have the right one available, especially for all Southeast Asian languages we do encounter.
When you arrive for the lottery your eligibility documents will be reviewed first. If you qualify you will be a given a lottery ticket and directed upstairs to the 3rd floor of the building.
Once upstairs our staff members will conduct the lottery by randomly choosing numbers from out of a box. New patients are chosen through the lottery process without consideration of gender, ethnicity, race or other factors.
If your number is called at the lottery you have just become a new patient of the RI Free Clinic. Congratulations – you are on your first step to good health!
Selected new patients are then asked to fill out new patient information, including a health history. Our volunteers will assist you with all the paperwork requirements.
You may be seen by a doctor on the very evening you have been selected as a new patient, or you may be asked to come back in the next few days for an appointment.
If your number is not called at the lottery, do not be discouraged. We hold a lottery on the first Thursday of every month, so we encourage you to come back to the next month’s lottery. As the Clinic continues to grow we will be accepting more new patients each month.
Being a RI resident without health insurance coverage satisfies two of the Clinic’s eligibility requirements.
The third requirement has to do with income. To qualify you must be at or below the federal poverty level. The table below shows the income guidelines based on gross income per week, month and year, based on family size.
PROOF OF ELIGIBILITY
You will need to present certain documents to help us determine your eligibility for free care.
To verify your eligibility you must bring the following three documents with you to the lottery:
- Picture ID – This can be a Rhode Island driver’s license, State ID, school or employer ID or other official documentation that show your name, photo and address.
- Proof of RI residency – We must verify that you live in RI. To satisfy this, you can show us your most recent phone or utility bill, or any other proof of your current address.
- Proof of income – You must show us your income status. This can be your most recent IRS tax return, last two pay stubs, or letters documenting your eligibility for unemployment compensation, temporary disability, social security check stubs. If you have no income, a copy of IRS Form 4506T.
- If you have no income, you must bring a letter stating your current living situation, signed by the person providing you with food and shelter. If you are living on savings or other resources, your letter should indicate that.