When Jiselle came back to New York City, healthcare for her family was only one item on a long, overwhelming list. Shelter, counseling, warm clothes for the winter, basic necessities, they needed all of it. She found a partner in The Floating Hospital. “Coming from Miami, we didn't have anything,” she recalls. The staff gave them “coats, shoes, clothes … sanitary pads, toothbrushes … They helped my family a lot,” she said. Since then, her family now relies on the medical care, dental, optometry, and behavioral health services we provide and make easy to reach through our Good Health Shuttle door-to-door transportation. The doctors she has seen have addressed her anxiety, lowered her blood pressure, and prescribed glasses to correct her blurred vision. “I don't think we would be going to the doctor as frequently as we do now because everything would be everywhere—different doctors, different services,” she says of coordinating care for herself and her three children. “We just make a call… and then we are seen. I don't think you can get that anywhere else.”

For her kids, The Floating Hospital has become more than a place for checkups. Her two daughters and son look forward to the health education classroom, where they draw, watch movies, and win prizes for answering health trivia. Her daughter Kimorah, gearing up for her first summer at Camp Rise Up, still sleeps every night with a small stuffed teddy bear she won playing bingo there. To Kimorah, the staff have become something more than providers. “They're family now. We've been coming here for a while and I know most of the people, and they're very caring,” she said. “They give you food, clothes, toys, everything you need… I love The Floating Hospital.”