BOSTON (WHDH) – A Boston doctor is marking a major milestone — he has spent 40 years helping others through Health Care for the Homeless. It’s a humble profession that even more humble beginnings and after all that time serving the community, he says the way he views homelessness has changed as well.
Dr. Jim O’Connell has been caring for Boston’s homeless community for four decades. O’Connell had his sights set on a prestigious oncology fellowship after graduating from Harvard and completing his residency at Mass General Brigham. But the chief of medicine offered him a different path, care for the city’s unhoused under a one-year program, Boston’s Health Care for the Homeless.
“At emergency rooms back then we were getting flooded with homeless people and the thought was how do we get out and take care of them,” he said…