- March 18, 2026
Drs. Rehana and Mussarat Siddiqui organized the Islamic Center of Daytona Beach's new free clinic, the Hope Community Health Center. Photo by Sierra Williams
Dr. Rehana Siddiqui will lead daily operations at the clinic. Photo by Sierra Williams
The Hope Community Health Center will be open on the weekends. Photo by Sierra Williams
The Hope Community Health Center is located at 825 Derbyshire Road, next to the Islamic Center of Daytona Beach. Photo by Sierra Williams
A staff of eight doctors and four nurse practitioners will operate the Hope Community Health Center. Photo by Sierra Williams
The Islamic Center of Daytona Beach is opening a new free clinic in March, filling a gap in medical care in the local community.
Many people in the Derbyshire Road area have not seen a doctor in years, said Dr. Rehana Siddiqui, the general practitioner who will be running the facility. At the new clinic, patients can receive a full health exam and receive necessary family medicine care, including prescriptions for hypertension and diabetes and more.
Siddiqui said she became a doctor in the first place to be able to care for her patients as individuals, not just a number. Working at a free clinic, she said, it’s especially important to get to know your patients.
“I think you treat the patient half [by] listening to them,” she said. “If you listen to them, they know somebody is caring.”
Located at 825 Derbyshire Road, adjacent to the Islamic Center, the Hope Community Health Center will be open to anyone, regardless of religious affiliation or race, who meet the income requirements.
This clinic will bring people from all over and from different backgrounds, Siddiqui said. And the Hope Community Health Center will treat them with a smile and dignity, just as their tagline states: “Care with compassion and dignity.”
A grand opening ceremony will be held on March 27, with the doors opening for operation at 9 a.m. on March 28. It will be open on weekends, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturdays and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sundays.
The clinic will serve as a general family medicine practice, not as an emergency room or for trauma care.
“There is a lot of need this will fill, and this will be irrespective of religion, color, creed, language,” said Siddiqui’s husband and anesthesiologist Dr. Mussarat Siddiqui.
The clinic will not have any cash or narcotics on hand, but will be able to refer patients in need of more specialized care to the right offices.
The idea for a free clinic started in 2025 when Siddiqui was asked by the Islamic Center to pick a community project. As someone who has worked in the Flagler Free Clinic for years, Siddiqui said she immediately knew she wanted help with a free clinic in the community.
But it was more of a process than she initially bargained for: Siddiqui would need to fundraise the $280,000 needed to build out the clinic and organize staff, equipment and training.
Thankfully, her husband stepped in to help. In 10 days, Mussarat Siddiqui had a majority of the funds raised from pledges from his fellow doctors and community members.
“All this money came from our friends,” he said. And not just from the Muslim community, he said, but from multiple backgrounds, all committing funding to a good cause.
Even people outside of the medical community have stepped in to help get the clinic up and running, he said, donating their time and skills to help get the word out and the clinic operational.
“Different people from different walks of life have come together to help us out, and they really understand the compassion we are coming with,” he said. “I’m very thankful.”
The Siddiquis have been practicing medicine in the local communities since the 1980s, with Rehana Siddiqui volunteering at the Flagler Free Clinic alongside her private practice work. Mussarat Siddiqui is the former AdventHealth Palm Coast Hospital’s chief of staff. Both are now retired but continue working part time in their respective fields.
Mussarat Siddiqui will not be working at the clinic, but will instead finalize the Hope Community Health Care Endowment so the clinic will be self-sufficient, a press release said.
Rehana Siddiqui will lead daily operations at the clinic, alongside a volunteer staff of eight doctors and four nurse practitioners, plus trained reception staff. Siddiqui said they expect to be extremely busy right away, as the local community is very underserved.
With 40 years as a general practitioner, Siddiqui said free clinic work was her passion.
“In free clinic [work], you have to use clinical judgement,” she said, instead of relying on referrals and technology. “And I think it makes you a better doctor.”
