Koreisha Senior Care & Advocacy (KSCA) and the Japanese American Medical Association (JAMA) are proud to hold their second annual Health Fair for the Japanese American community on Saturday, Oct. 26, from 11 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at the St. Francis Xavier Japanese Catholic Center (formerly Maryknoll), 222 S. Hewitt St., Los Angeles.

Initially, the annual Nikkei Health Fairs in Little Tokyo were offered by the dedicated members of the Taisho Club for 38 years. Along with physicians, nurses, other health care providers and volunteers, they made the yearly event possible for as many as 800 participants. The event provided free consultations by various medical specialists and offered a blood test and a flu shot at a minimal cost. Blood test results were explained two weeks later in Japanese or in English.

Over the years, the fair became a valuable tradition of the community, particularly for Nikkei seniors who found it difficult to travel to the doctor's office. This was an opportunity to ask the experts all of the questions they had always wanted to ask. Translation was provided for the monolingual Japanese attendees.

Past events had specialists in internal medicine, ophthalmology, dermatology, cardiology, urology, general surgery, podiatry, gastroenterology, orthopedics, rheumatism, chiropractic/massage, psychiatry, dentistry, acupuncture and others.

Due to aging membership, the Taisho Club disbanded a few years ago, passing the community tradition started by them to KSCA and JAMA in 2023.

KSCA President John Kanai and JAMA President Barry Goy, MD are excited to hold the second Health Fair this year, and have plans to continue the tradition into the future. They are anticipating 300+ individuals from the Greater Los Angeles area to participate and approximately 100 volunteers to offer the services.