Our Story (MFCC)

In 2003, a local church in Moore County held a Health Fair for its members after church one day to check for high blood pressure and other health issues which might be identified. When the health committee of the church met to evaluate this event the question was raised, “All of our members have health insurance! What should we be doing to care for those in our area who are uninsured and cannot afford access to health care?” The idea of a free medical clinic for Moore County was born that day. Dr. H. David Bruton, a retired pediatrician and former Secretary for Health and Human Services with the State of North Carolina, was a member of this congregation and participated in this event and evaluation.

Around that same time, this same local church was participating in an effort to house homeless families. The pastor at that time, Mark W. Wethington, who became one of the co-founders of the Moore Free Care Clinic, along with Dr. Bruton, got to know one of the families which were sleeping in the church as part of this homeless program. Some months later, after the family was settled in housing, he ran into one of the family members around town and asked her how her father was doing. She said, “He died last month.” “What happened?” asked Rev. Wethington. She said, “My father never went to a doctor because he didn’t have health insurance and couldn’t afford to go, and then suddenly he ended up in the emergency room and they found cancer all in him. He did not live long after that.”

This event, coupled with the Health Fair evaluation, led Rev. Wethington to write an article for the local newspaper, The Pilot, about the need for a free clinic in the community. The day after the article was published, Rev. Wethington received a phone call from a local resident, a retiree, asking him to come visit her and tell her more about the free clinic concept. He made the visit, talked with her for about one hour and then thanked her for her interest. The next day, when Rev. Wethington was not in the church office, this same woman came by the office and dropped off an envelope to him. When he got back to the office he found the envelope on his desk and opened it. A note inside read, “Open the doors” and included a check for $100,000! In April 2004 the doors of the clinic were opened to patients. This generous donor always wanted to remain anonymous.

The clinic began in 2004 in 600 square feet of the Department of Health building in Carthage. The patient base quickly grew and the clinic quickly outgrew the space it had. In 2008, the clinic applied for two grants for capital funding, one from the Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust and the other from the Cannon Foundation in Concord, NC. Both rewarded grant monies to the clinic in the total amount of $180,000 which allowed the clinic to renovate a 3000 square foot space in Southern Pines. Renovations were completed and the clinic began seeing patients in its new location in May 2009.