When he was a teenager, Stan Brock left his home in Britain for the Amazon rain forest. For 15 years, he lived with the Wapishana Indians in the jungles of Guyana, in South America, while working on a cattle ranch. Brock emerged from the experience with a clear idea of how to help others. It came to him while riding a horse the Wapishana called Devil. The horse charged into a corral and tumbled onto Brock, injuring him. "The nearest doctor was 28 days away, on foot," Brock told TFK. "That's when I got the idea to bring doctors closer to people who need them."
Brock became a bush pilot, providing free air-ambulance service out of the Amazon jungle. He also went on to costar in a TV series, Wild Kingdom, that took American viewers to exotic locations.
In 1985, Brock founded Remote Area Medical (RAM), a nonprofit group based in Tennessee that delivers doctors and medicine to areas where people don't have access to health care. RAM has sent medical teams to India, Tanzania, Haiti and the U.S. About 47 million Americans don't have health insurance.
A Helping Hand Across AmericaRAM began holding weekend clinics in the U.S. in 1992. Volunteer doctors, nurses, dentists and veterinarians travel from around the country to provide free medical care. Some of the equipment and medicine are donated. Makeshift exam rooms are set up on fairgrounds, in schools wherever there is space. A year after Hurricane Katrina, RAM held a clinic at the New Orleans Zoo, in Louisiana. "Giraffes were looking over the fence at the dentists," Brock says. "Ophthalmologists were working by the alligator swamp."
RAM operates on a shoestring. Brock takes no salary. He says that donations keep things running.
In 1997, RAM treated 17,000 Americans. Many drive hundreds of miles and arrive at clinics hours early. Even then, some may not get a checkup. There are simply not enough doctors. For all the people Brock has helped, he is haunted by the ones whom he has had to turn away. He would like to get more support from businesses. He also wants the government to pass laws that would make it easier for doctors to practice outside their home states. Brock's dream: "To get millions of people treated, instead of tens of thousands."