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California doctors make house calls — to talk about California’s 2026 primary election

May 29, 2026

With his white coat on, Dr. Ilan Shapiro walked around Santa Ana, making house calls. The pediatrician was on a mission to talk to the community about health — civic health, that is.

AltaMed doctors and medical professionals traded stethoscopes for fliers advertising voting sites and canvassed neighborhoods in Santa Ana ahead of the June 2 Election Day to connect with residents who had been diagnosed as low-propensity or inconsistent voters. They reminded residents about the election and helped them make a plan to vote.

Dr. Cristina Romero (front, right), Dr. Regina Inchizu, her daughter Aloura, and Dr. Ilan Shapiro (left) speak to a Santa Ana resident on her lawn to ask if she plans to vote in the upcoming primaries. (Photo courtesy of AltaMed)

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Connecting civic engagement and healthcare, Shapiro said, makes sense.

“One of the most important things that I can do as a doctor is take care of my patients and my communities,” Shapiro said.

He often shares guidance with his patients on the best foods to eat, the science behind exercise, Shapiro said, but reality for many of them makes healthy living difficult or unattainable. Healthier foods can be unaffordable or just not available for many of his patients, he said, and several communities lack safe green spaces.

“The combination of making sure that they (the patients) are taken care of in the community and also making sure that we are being represented and have better green spaces, safer spaces, no food deserts — that actually comes from policy,” Shapiro said.

Dr. Regina Inchizu, who practices family medicine at AltaMed’s Huntington Park clinic, agreed.

“I, as a physician, understand that there’s so much environmentally, there is so much within society that is worsening your diabetes and is worsening your ability to control your high blood pressure,” Inchizu said. “Whether that’s lack of access to food or lack or access to green spaces or environmental toxins.”

The recent Garden Grove chemical threat underscored the doctors’ civic mission, said Inchizu. Should the tank at the aerospace facility have exploded or spilled the substance methyl methacrylate, or MMA, serious harm could have been caused to residents’ respiratory or nervous systems, experts had said.

“Voting really affects health,” Inchizu said. “It is really important that we get people into office who are going to consider our health and what our needs are as a community, and how do they better protect us and serve us.”

“If you really want to improve your health, your family’s health, your communities, we have to get out there and vote,” said Inchizu. “Our vote is important, even though sometimes it feels like it’s not. And the more we speak up for ourselves, the better we can make our communities.”

The team of doctors didn’t tell residents who to vote for, they said, but rather simply let them know about vote centers opening up and explained how the way mail is postmarked could impact whether their ballot is counted.

“Everybody has different values,” said Shapiro, “and a sense of what is the best thing for their family.”

Shapiro said he encountered a whole range of people while out canvassing. Some had completely forgotten about the ongoing election, or had not opened their ballots at all.

“It’s one thing actually getting the ballot, and the other is actually using it,” he said.

In all, 25 community members and five AltaMed doctors made house calls ahead of Election Day.

The prescription? Vote.

California doctors make house calls — to talk about California’s 2026 primary election Orange County Register

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California doctors make house calls — to talk about California’s 2026 primary election

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