Building Trust, Creating Home: Lessons from a Community Clinic
September 18, 2025
Dr. Hijab Zubairi, MD, MPH, Co-Director of the Health Equity and Advocacy Pathway at UCLA, identified a problem: a lack of housing can create distrust between unhoused people and medical professionals due to distance and prior trauma. Her response, a medical home—a clinic that provides urgent and primary care services for the unhoused—provides a crucial starting point for building trust between medical professionals and a vulnerable population group. Through the Building Trust: Advancing Health Equity Grant Program, Dr. Zubairi and her team facilitate compassionate, responsive, and accessible care for patients who critically need it.
The clinic provides comprehensive services, including:
- diagnostic assessment
- regular follow-up
- mental health services
- onsite labs
- vaccines
- other preventive services
A robust turnout at the clinic shows a warm response from the unhoused community. Since its launch, the team at UCLA has seen 211 patients. Because of the significant patient interest, the team has increased the clinic’s frequency to twice a month.
The program has a medical education component, with UCLA Internal Medicine residents staffing the clinic with an attending physician for a half-day during each clinic week during their second year and third year of residency. This component ensures that the next generation of medical professionals acquires the skills necessary to build trust with vulnerable populations. “Former residents have noted this experience as ‘the highlight of [their] residency,’ and it has led to a shift in career focus to include homeless healthcare after graduation,” Dr. Zubairi said.
The “medical home” has demonstrably built trust between unhoused individuals and clinicians. What makes this clinic unique is its strong relationship with community partners. In fact, the start of the clinic led to the launch of larger homeless services known as “Wednesday Drop In” where clients are provided with meals, case management, and clothing. “One major qualitative outcome of this project is the enhancement of trust in multiple facets: between community partners and healthcare providers, between interprofessional members of the healthcare team, and between healthcare providers and the patients they care for,” reported Dr. Zubairi.
Through Dr. Zubairi’s program at UCLA, trust is built along the way with the creation of a medical home: the clinic where patients receive reliable, attentive care. Patient by patient, the clinic breaks down barriers and forges bonds toward lasting community trust.
