Revisiting the Order of Malta Clinic

The Order of Malta Clinic of Northern California welcomed special guests on July 10. Three of the five founding board members, Herman Carmassi, Tom Greerty and Jack Hockel, DDS, returned to the clinic, some of them seeing it for the first time since its expansion.  

 In 2006, when Bishop Allen Vigneron, now archbishop emeritus of the Detroit Archdiocese, approached the Order of Malta of Northern California, asking if they would assist with the new cathedral complex and offering space for a clinic so the order could continue its commitment to ministering to the sick completely free of charge. The original clinic opened in 2008.  

 “The idea was born on a hope and a prayer, and it all worked out,” Greerty said.  

 The redesigned clinic was expanded to meet the increasing needs of an estimated 500,000 uninsured and underinsured people in the Bay Area. The clinic doubled its number of exam rooms to six and now includes an additional four private rooms for consultations and telehealth visits.  

 In 2024, patients from more than 80 cities in Northern California came to the clinic for treatment. Projections indicate the clinic will serve 6,000 patients in 2025, an increase of 30%. 

 Clinic staff and volunteers, including Dr. Tom Wallace, who has volunteered at the clinic for more than 10 years, gave the former board members a tour.  

Left to right: Herman Carmassi; Tom Wallace, MD; Jack Hockel, DDS and Tom Greerty. Photo credit: Scott Saraceno for the Order of Malta of Northern California.

Dr. Wallace recalled that Carmassi was the reason he first came to the clinic. The two are neighbors and both parishioners at St. Theresa in Oakland. Carmassi approached Dr. Wallace after Mass one day and asked him to volunteer. Their pastor overheard and endorsed the idea. “How could I say no?” Dr. Wallace asked rhetorically.  

 Since the re-opening, clinic hours have been extended on Thursdays to 7 pm. In addition, the clinic uses Boostlingo Interpreter Service, a medically certified translation service, to communicate with patients in 300 languages. This is especially useful to the patients the clinic serves from countries such as Eritrea, Ethiopia, the Philippines and Mongolia. 

 The corporal works of mercy the clinic provides would not be possible without its dedicated staff and volunteers who have expertise in more than 15 medical specialties. Over the lifetime of the clinic, 17 years and counting, those volunteers have logged more than 105,000 hours in service to others. 

 

Visit https://www.orderofmaltaclinic.com/contact for full clinic hours; call 510-587-3000 to make an appointment.