Dr. Tracey Young’s new patient had been incarcerated at the age of 17. He’d met his baby daughter for the first time in prison, an event he said had changed his life.

“That was the moment he decided, ‘What am I doing? This is not sustainable. This is not the life I want for myself and my family,’” recalled Dr. Young, the director of medical services at the Free Clinic of Simi Valley in southern California.

But the patient, who had a highly noticeable, profane tattoo across his forehead, was having difficulty finding employment. He’d received the tattoo while newly imprisoned, and now, several years later, it was keeping him from moving on with his life. “It was so hard to get up in the morning and look at himself and try to make a change,” Dr. Young said.

For the last year and a half, FCSV has provided a tattoo removal service, free of charge, for people who have been incarcerated or were victims of human trafficking. The laser used for removal and the associated services were provided by Ventura County, which partners with the clinic to provide this service without cost.

Dr. Young explained that tattoo removal often isn’t just a question of emotionally moving on, or even finding a job: For gang members and people who have escaped from being trafficked, having an identifying tattoo can place them in much greater danger.

“It makes you a marked person,” she said. Removing these symbols “really releases [patients] from the hold they were under.”

Fred Bauermeister, the clinic’s executive director, made clear that, while most tattoo removals are considered cosmetic, not medical, FCSV’s patients are motivated by safety and the hope of financial stability.

“This is not a cosmetic thing,” he said. “These are people who are trying to make better lives.”

For FCSV’s providers, who were specifically trained to practice medicine in rural settings, learning to remove tattoos was a far cry from delivering babies, monitoring chronic diseases, or suturing wounds – which made learning the procedure exciting, Dr. Young said: “That’s something in family practice we don’t see every day,” she said. “It’s fun as doctors to be able to learn new things, and it’s fun to help people in such a positive way.”

While the training that doctors received explained that a professionally inked tattoo might take eight to 10 sessions for removal, they quickly learned that prison tattoos responded much more quickly, within two to three sessions.

Tattoo removals are painful. The laser doctors use essentially irritates the area to encourage the body’s natural defenses to kick in, working to heal the blistering and inflammation – and breaking down the ink’s chemical bonds at the same time, Dr. Young said.

That was the case for the young father with the forehead tattoo.

“Removing a tattoo from the face is not comfortable, but he was in it for a long haul,” she remembered. “Every time he came, it was a little brighter, a little bit further gone, and you could just see him brightening.”

Particular care is taken with victims of trafficking, who receive services during separate hours and are given complete privacy from other patients while at the clinic.

But while some providers had initial concerns about providing tattoo removals for patients who had been incarcerated, Dr. Young said the experience has been wholly positive.

“We haven’t had a single problem,” she said. “They have been so polite and so kind.”

Some tattoo removal patients are extremely embarrassed or apologetic. Others are simply thrilled.

“They made different life choices earlier, and they want to make a new one, a better one,” Dr. Young said. “It’s hard to do that if you have profanity tattooed on your face.”

The laser used for tattoo removal – as well as the clinic’s medical refrigerators and dental program – is dependent on electricity in an area that experiences frequent power outages. A Direct Relief Power for Health grant of $165,000 funded a resilient solar power system on the clinic’s rooftop that became operational late last year, and an additional grant of $250,000 allowed a battery to be paired with the project – a total of $415,000.

While the Power for Health project was primarily intended to protect vaccines and other clinical operations, having a reliable source of electricity has had positive impacts across the board, Bauermeister said: “It’s a big deal around here when the power goes out.”

Before the solar power system was installed, power outages placed expensive vaccines at risk, often at the height of fire season and just before school began, and frequently shut down operations in the dental program. “Medical can get by with a flashlight,” as Bauermeister explained, but other services were repeatedly compromised.

Being able to reliably provide services during a power outage has made a significant difference to clinic staff, Dr. Young said.

“We’re [a clinic] that’s here for the community,” she explained, adding that FCSV has plans to add a vision clinic to its existing services. “These are just steps that we’re using to help our community grow.”

Like safety net providers across the country, part of FCSV’s work involves connecting patients to partner organizations that help people find stable housing, access health insurance, receive food assistance, and meet other social drivers of health – the non-medical factors that affect health over time. Dr. Young sees the tattoo removal service as similarly impactful: It’s an economical and quick way to help someone move on safely and gain greater financial stability, giving them a better chance at building and maintaining their well-being.

“This was something we could do that not only helps them react to a problem, but solve it before it’s started,” she said.