Lifetime Special Profiles Woman Working To Increase Latinos’ Access to Health Services

"Our Heros, Ourselves," a Lifetime Television program premiering May 16, includes a profile of a woman who created an organization to increase Latinos' access to health care. To address barriers to care she observed while working as a director of a medical clinic, Maria Gomez-Murphy founded the organization, called The Way of the Heart: The Promotoras Institute, in Nogales, Ariz., a town two miles north of the U.S. border where 54% of residents do not have health insurance. The two-year-old Institute serves about 80 people -- mostly women -- per day, providing counseling services; information on prenatal and pospartum care, cardiovascular health, diabetes and smoking cessation; free glucose and cholesterol testing; and support groups for people with diabetes and cancer. Gomez-Murphy's organization uses promotoras, or groups of trained women who teach other women how to access local health services. The program is hosted by actress Marlo Thomas, who also served as executive producer. The program airs at 7 p.m. ET May 16 (Lifetime release, 5/10).