A new University of Chicago clinic in Streeterville became a flash point this afternoon in the controversy over the school's plans to refocus its medical services -- a move that some South Side residents say is an effort to ditch poor patients in favor of wealthier ones. 

About 30 protesters gathered outside the clinic, 150 E. Huron, this afternoon, singing protest songs and chanting. They say the clinic epitomizes UCMC’s abandonment of the South Side, as it reorganizes to incorporate more high-tech research and procedures.

The clinic, just off the Magnificent Mile, offers everything from cardiology and endocrinology to sleep medicine and dermatology.

Protester Wardell Lavender says he came because his South Side neighborhood needs access to health facilities.

"I don't think the University of Chicago has compassion for poor people," he says.

The university's marketing efforts for the clinic have angered some of the protesters. A video explaining the clinic pitches "personalized" medicine for busy people in the downtown area. In it, one doctor promises that "We are now treating patients as individuals, not as a disease”

"My first thought was how much they spent on that video," says Matthew Gisnberg-Jaeckle, a spokesman for Southside Together Organizing for Power, which organized the demonstration.

The U of C has said some service cutbacks were caused by budget concerns. 

Medical Center spokesman John Easton says several physicians from the hospital see patients at the downtown clinic a few days a week. Meanwhile, he says, the university has invested more than $12 million in creating a network of community health care providers across the South Side. Those clinics also draw on university physicians.

Easton says the Streeterville clinic's focus on personalized medicine doesn't mean there is different care offered downtown than at the main campus in Hyde Park.

“Rather, it is an example of positive trends in medical care more generally. The combination of different specialties at one office means that patients can get a complete, personalized assessment in a timely way, bringing the high quality of our Hype Park hospital to a smaller downtown setting," he says.

Former U of C professor Mel Rothenberg says the service at the Streeterville clinic was different. 

When he needed to see a cardiologist, he was told it would be a three-month wait to book an appointment at the university's Hyde Park campus.

But the Streeterville clinic offerend him an immediate appointment.

Rothenberg signed up, and didn’t even have time to crack open a book before his number was called.

“It was wonderful. It was Rolls-Royce,” he says. “The doctor spent about 40 minutes talking with me about my condition. I’ve never gotten that type of treatment here at Hyde Park.”

While Rothenberg was happily surprised by the treatment he received at the Gold Coast clinic, which bills itself on a Web site as a place where “we can now take the time to actually describe to you what the risk is,” he worries that it’s emblematic of trend where the university abandons the South Side.

“I’m upset by it because I think that it means they are less interested in serving the South Side of Chicago, even the Hyde Park community,” he says. “They’re more interested about reaching out to wealthier (communities) on the North Side.”