Once again, United to Serve hits community mark
By Lin Lofley
United to Serve, the community service event led by students at UT Southwestern Medical Center, recently assisted more than 180 Dallas-area families, many of whom annually set aside the day for the opportunity to receive medical information and attention.
Marketed as the Carnaval de Salud for the primarily Spanish-speaking community in the neighborhood near campus, United to Serve provides a fun, family-friendly environment to provide engaging and important health information to the public. In its second decade at the Thomas J. Rusk Middle School, on Inwood Road, the event unites UT Southwestern students, faculty, and staff through volunteerism and community giving.
Students began organizing and preparing for the 12th adaptation of the event last September – researching materials for handouts, seeking out helpful phone apps to teach patrons, obtaining donated items to give away at the booths, and contacting faculty for additional support – in order to provide comprehensive health screenings and education.
The students’ hard work paid off. Throughout the day, health screenings stations stayed busy in the T.J. Rusk classrooms. More than 50 sports physicals were conducted, along with a like number of hearing tests, 80 vision examinations, and 150 diabetes and cholesterol screening tests. Additionally, health fairgoers were provided with information about extra resources that they can seek out.
The fun aspect was not lost either, as the gyms and hallways in T.J. Rusk remained packed with volunteers engaging people in interactive experiments and activities.
“We can’t do this without the active assistance of the broad spectrum of UT Southwestern,” said Dr. Elizabeth Wegleitner, then a fourth-year medical student, but now beginning an obstetrics and gynecology residency at St. Louis’ Mercy Hospital. “And we’re talking about the assistance of many, many people.”
Dr. Wegleitner, Donations Chair of the students’ United to Serve committee, pointed to more than $11,000 in donations to the event by 70 individuals or businesses. As a group, those donors contributed 130 prize packages – many of them family meals at Dallas restaurants – and two kid’s bicycles, one adults bicycle, more than 50 bicycle helmets, and a prom dress valued at $4,000.
Drawings were held throughout the five-hour event, and all the while the main focus of the event – the wellbeing of UT Southwestern’s neighbors – continued with education, games, and information dispensed by social service agencies from both the City of Dallas and Dallas County.
“The fair is more than just a screening site,” said United to Serve co-Director Dr. Rachel Brady, then a fourth-year medical student, but now in a residency in obstetrics and gynecology at UT Southwestern. “It is an engaging, welcoming event where patrons learn about common medical conditions, preventative health care and lifestyle choices, and enjoy interactive and educational activities for the whole family. Fun is key as we strive to live up to the name Carnaval de Salud.”
