LEWISTON —  Lewiston’s B-Street Community Center health clinic does much more than just take temperatures and bandage knees, according to Executive Director Joan Churchill.

Community needs have forced it to expand beyond basic health clinic tasks, including a range of mental health, dentistry and optometry services, even legal help.

“We try to get people in here, to the doctor, first, before something is really wrong,” Churchill said Wednesday. “The baby step is getting them in the door, and then we get the help they need. We get them in to get help from the St. Mary’s Nutrition Center or from the attorneys.”

Churchill runs Community Clinical Services, the federally qualified health clinic at the center of Lewiston’s B-Street. On Wednesday, she gave a personal tour of the clinic to Emily Cain, the Democratic candidate for the 2nd Congressional District.

Cain is hoping to unseat Republican Bruce Poliquin in November.

Cain said she met this summer with the Maine Primary Care Association, a group that represents health clinics across Maine, and asked to see practicing clinics.

“It’s an issue that’s important all across state — access to care,” she said. “The clinics are important in places like Lewiston, where there is a concentrated need, but also in rural parts of the state. They play a very important role in rural Maine.”

Churchill said she’s eager to spread the word about the Twin Cities network of clinics, which includes the B-Street Center, a satellite health center at 100 Campus Ave., a dental clinic at 60 Second St. in Auburn and health clinics at Lewiston and Auburn middle schools, Auburn’s Edward Little High School and Lewiston High School.

Churchill said the clinic had more than 16,000 patient visits at the network of sites last year.

“It all has to do with location, location, location,” Churchill said. “We are the closest medical office for many of the immigrants and refugees in the downtown. So we really try to make it welcoming to everyone.”

Aga Matusiak, practice manager at the B-Street health center, said the office might be even more important for recent immigrants who may not know where else to turn for help.

“Myself, I may go to the doctor once a year,” she said. “But we have patients who will come in once a month, and not because they need to but because something pops up that they don’t know where else to turn.”

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