By Robyn Alie, Manager, MMS Policy and Public Health
This is an extended version of a story that appeared in the print edition of Vital Signs.
How does global health inform local practice? How can Massachusetts physicians help build medical capacity abroad? In February, the MMS New England Global Health Conference for Trainees explored opportunities and issues relating to practice in lower-resourced settings abroad. Vital Signs spoke with participants about the value and relevance of global health experience.
Making High-Pressure Decisions
“I worked at a district hospital in Ghana trying to provide respite care for the doctors. The most challenging thing was making decisions about how to allocate limited resources. Do you give oxygen to the sickest kid, or the kid who is most likely to live? We are forced to make diagnoses without having many labs, without having any imaging. You’re really just focusing on what you can do. It forced me to grow in that way.”
— Diane Smith, MD, Lawrence Family Medicine Residency
Building Capacity
“I’m from Pakistan and there is a lot of potential there, a lot of patients in advanced stages of cancer. In the future, I am going to make a collaborative system between these two institutions [Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Center and Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women’s Cancer Center]. Where I got trained is one of the [most] sophisticated hospitals in Pakistan, but it needs further development, especially in radiation oncology. Here, we have a lot of resources, but we need to learn to utilize them better.”
— M. Mohsin Fareed, MD, radiation oncology fellow, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School
Reciprocal Learning
“It works both ways. I work as a primary care physician in a community health center. I see patients from around the world. I would love to hear from providers who work in these countries about health care there, because that helps me better understand what my patients [here] are seeking. Through shared learning, you can build these capacities without physically ever having been abroad.”
— Aditya Chandrasekhar, MD, MPH, Fenway Health
Revitalizing Physicians
“I look at it as personal enrichment. We talk about physician burnout here because of electronic health records, time crunches, limited time with patients — but when you go to low-resource settings abroad, you come back and think: ‘We have it good here. This is not too bad after all.’ I come back empowered.”
— Arul Mahadeven, MD, FRCS, Radiation Oncology Associates, Lahey Hospital & Medical Center
Treating Immigrant Populations
“I have a strong interest in immigrant and refugee health, especially in the US. Low-resource areas in other countries can help inform your practice here in Massachusetts. We have a lot of Dominican and Puerto Rican patients, especially after recent natural disasters. Learning how to do things related to disaster preparedness and infectious diseases, in addition to other types of triage medicine, is important training.”
— Melissa Palma, MD, resident
