By Monica Simmons
Communications Coordinator
This week we’re kicking off our #Peoples50for50 project with a story from Nurse Candice Trulson, who has been at People’s Community Clinic since 2001.
Candice is one of those people whose doesn’t call her job a “job,” rather, a calling. When she was a little girl—an immigrant from Vietnam—she had an experience that changed the course of her life. As the family awaited entrance into the U.S., her mother endured terrible suffering in a refugee camp where she was unable to receive medical care. It was then that Candice made it her personal mission to do what she could to undo the injustice and inequality in the healthcare system.
“Health care should be blind,” said Candice. “There is no creed, color, no race, and certainly there is no monetary value when you deliver medical, dental, any services that help to heal that person.”
As an adult, Candice worked at several health centers before coming to People’s where she found the mission and culture aligned with her own.
“People’s provides services that I don’t see in other clinics,” Candice said. “We offer wrap-around care that makes a big difference in our patient’s lives.”
Nursing, she says, is a noble career, but one that is often invisible. Still, she wouldn’t change a thing about the path she’s chosen.
“Nurses are the ones who manage patients over the phones. We’re the ones on the receiving end of a patient’s amazing story that causes pain, anger, fatigue, sometimes joy,” said Candice. “We are privileged to be trusted with their deepest moments.”
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This year is BIG for People’s Community Clinic. In 2020 People’s marks 50 years of providing affordable, accessible health care to Central Texans in need. That’s 50 years of serving Central Texas communities with dignity and respect; 50 years of collaborating with other area non-profits for integrative care; 50 years of working for #healthequity and #affordablecare in Central Texas.