Bridging ancestral healing traditions with modern medicine, this Oakland-based clinic is redefining what accessible, culturally relevant healthcare looks like for Black, brown, and immigrant communities.

When Bernadette Lim speaks about healthcare, she doesn’t just draw from her medical education—she speaks from generations of lived experience. As the first physician in her Filipino family, Lim’s journey into medicine was shaped by witnessing her family’s complex relationship with healthcare.

“I come from a family that has a lot of distrust in the medical system,” Lim explains. “I always joke that our doctors were not in the hospital, but they were actually at church, and they were in our traditional Filipino foods. I also like to say Sprite and Vicks VapoRub—those were my doctors.”

While these cultural remedies addressed many of her family’s needs, more complex medical conditions required formal healthcare encounters—experiences that Lim describes as “filled with a lot of distrust and fear and a lack of security.” This disconnect became particularly evident when her mother faced reproductive health issues and underwent procedures without full consent.

It was this personal history that inspired Lim to pursue medicine and ultimately create Freedom Community Clinic, an organization that bridges Western medicine with holistic, cultural healing traditions prevalent in Black, brown, and immigrant communities.

Building a New Model of Healthcare

Freedom Community Clinic began humbly in 2020, with Lim—then a 24-year-old medical student—organizing pop-up clinics throughout the community during a time of civil unrest. These grassroots efforts quickly gained momentum.

“We would hold healing clinics out in parks and streets and freeway underpasses after the George Floyd protests in 2020 in partnership with communities, community members and alternative health practitioners,” Lim recalls.

What began as impromptu gatherings has evolved into a comprehensive healthcare ecosystem that has served over 7,500 individuals, primarily from Black and immigrant communities in the Bay Area. The clinic’s approach is distinctly holistic bringing together practitioners of Western medicine, primary care, and health education alongside acupuncturists, massage therapists, indigenous energy healers, and yoga instructors.

Five Pillars of Community Healing

Today, Freedom Community Clinic operates through five core initiatives that reflect its evolution from a grassroots movement to an established community healthcare provider:

1. Pop-up Healing Clinics: The original model continues, with weekly clinics operated in partnership with over 75 organizations throughout the year. These partners range from the Oakland Department of Violence Prevention to services for foster youth and those at risk of trafficking.
2. School-Based Healing Programs: The clinic provides weekly healing electives for over 250 students, families, and staff at middle schools, high schools, and universities throughout Oakland—where gun violence and community trauma are prevalent concerns.
3. Community Healing Centers: Two permanent locations in East and West Oakland offer free integrative health services three days a week, including integrative medicine consultations, community acupuncture, and cultural cleansing practices such as limpias. All services are available in both English and Spanish.
4. Apprenticeship Programs: The clinic trains young people of color and Spanish-speaking immigrant women in their whole-person healing framework through a comprehensive “healing first aid curriculum” that includes traditional first aid alongside meditation, yoga, breathwork, and herbalism.
5. Medicinal Farm and Apothecary: A one-acre farm grows cultural and ancestral herbs, which are transformed into community teas at their West Oakland location, which doubles as a pharmacy apothecary addressing chronic health conditions.

Measurable Impact and Cultural Relevance

The impact of Freedom Community Clinic’s approach is measurable and significant. According to Lim, over 80 percent of those served had never previously accessed holistic healing modalities or integrative health services. Their evaluations show that 60 percent of participants have experienced decreased stress and anxiety, while 75 percent have integrated holistic health practices into their daily lives to address chronic conditions.

Critical to this success is the clinic’s commitment to cultural relevance and community leadership. The organization’s core team is composed entirely of community members who reflect the identities of those they serve—an intergenerational collective of Black, brown, immigrant women of color and gender non-binary people of color.

“Our staff on a leadership level is all comprised of community members that reflect the identities of the communities that we serve and/or are rooted from Oakland,” Lim explains. “So that really maintains for us to create this consistent feedback and dialogue.”

This representation extends beyond symbolic inclusion. The clinic’s apprenticeship programs operate on a “pay it forward” educational model that enables community members to become healing practitioners themselves, creating a sustainable cycle of community-led care.

Navigating Challenges and Growth

Despite its success—or perhaps because of it—Freedom Community Clinic faces significant challenges. Chief among these is managing overwhelming demand for services.

“I think the biggest challenge is definitely the demand right now,” Lim notes. “I remember in the very beginning we were begging people to have any healing clinics or healing workshops. And now the demand is so huge that several institutions are continuing to make spaces in their budget because they realize that we are able to address it at a community level that maybe other people are not able to.”

This surge in demand coincides with challenging political and social conditions that affect everything from funding to safety. Lim acknowledges the delicate balance required to “stay true to the mission of providing holistic health in a financially accessible and community-based way” while navigating “political uncertainties, unexpected funding, the safety of our locations, the safety of our staff.”

Bridging Ancient Wisdom with Modern Medicine

As both a Western-trained physician and community healer, Lim occupies a unique position at the intersection of these different approaches to health. She recognizes both the strengths and limitations of conventional medicine.

“There are amazing strengths to the Western medicine model, especially for acute trauma and infection,” Lim acknowledges. “However, we live in a world where people are getting older, and the quality of life is really affected by chronic disease, mental health, and the rise of other immune issues that don’t have a clear one-size-fits-all solution that Western medicine simply does not have the answers for.”

This recognition forms the foundation of Freedom Community Clinic’s integrative approach—one that honors ancestral healing traditions that “have been present for thousands of years before Western medicine, that have such an amazing, low risk, low cost, less invasive way of addressing mental, emotional and spiritual diseases.”

Lim sees her role as a translator between these worlds: “As a Western medicine doctor, I do know how Western medicine thinks. I know their different languages, the different frameworks, the ways they want specific research to be presented. And I see it as my responsibility and privilege to be able to help bridge these two worlds.”

From Grassroots to Growth: The Echoing Green Impact

A critical turning point in Freedom Community Clinic’s journey came with Lim’s selection as an Echoing Green Fellow. This prestigious fellowship provided not only financial resources but also professional networks and structural support at a crucial moment.

“Echoing Green came to me when I was a 24-year-old medical student, just so passionate about this mission. And I would organize these clinics out of my car trunk and our friend’s garage,” Lim recalls. “Echoing Green has really opened that door not only financially, but the networks and the support system.”

With this support, Freedom Community Clinic has evolved from a passion project funded through Venmo and Cash App donations to what Lim proudly describes as “one of the nation’s first community-based holistic and integrative health systems.”

Looking to the Future

Having established a successful model in the Bay Area, Freedom Community Clinic is now focused on sharing its approach more broadly. This September, the organization will host its “Healing to the People National Summit Convening,” bringing together professionals from medicine, academia, public health, farming, arts, and mutual aid collectives to discuss building community healing coalitions.

“Moving forward, our biggest thing is how are we able to share the lessons that we’ve learned and help others in different regions scale our model in ways that are appropriate to the local context,” Lim explains.

The clinic is also increasing its publishing and research efforts, sharing its model through UNESCO, the American Public Health Association, and other professional networks.

Through it all, Lim remains connected to the core mission that inspired her journey: bringing healing back to communities that have historically been marginalized by conventional healthcare systems. Freedom Community Clinic stands as powerful evidence that accessible, culturally-relevant, community-driven healthcare isn’t just an aspirational concept—it’s a viable, scalable model that is already improving thousands of lives.

For more information about Freedom Community Clinic and its programs, visit https://www.freedomcommunityclinic.org/ or follow their work on social media.