For students aiming for a career in the health professions, ETSU – a premier health sciences institution – offers numerous chances to learn and gain hands-on experience through education abroad.
From medical outreach in Malawi to health humanities in Italy, East Tennessee State University students are taking their education global through ETSU’s health-focused study abroad programs.
Students can take part in trips led by ETSU faculty, including medical humanities courses in Europe, medical outreach experiences in Malawi and Belize and rehabilitation efforts in Costa Rica.
ETSU has consortium agreements with various universities and partnerships with schools across the globe that allow students to study health policy, comparative health care, languages in health care professions, biology, chemistry, psychology, nutrition, physical education and other relevant topics.
Destinations for health care-related education abroad include Scotland; Ireland; New Zealand; Argentina; Costa Rica, Spain, Australia, Italy, Peru, Greece, the Netherlands, China, Japan, Croatia, United Arab Emirates and many more.
ETSU offers faculty-led global experiences
Dr. Melissa Schrift, a professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology and director of ETSU’s culture and health minor, has planned and led several of these trips.
Schrift looks forward to a winter session course on “one health” in Australia this year.
“The concept of ‘one health’ encourages us to think about the interconnectedness of human health with animal and environmental health,” she said, “so we will visit animal sanctuaries, including a koala hospital, as well as an Aboriginal college.”
She is also busy planning the fourth summer course on medical humanities in the U.K. and Italy, in which students visit sites related to the origins of Western medicine.
“Students get to see the anatomical and operating theaters they have read about, as well as visit medical museums like the Hunterian, based on the pioneering surgeon, John Hunter,” she said. “For pre-health students, understanding the evolution of medicine is a way of understanding the process of scientific discovery as well as the formation of medical education and practice. To understand the context of bloodletting is to understand the significance of evidence-based medicine.”
Schrift said an important component of health-related education abroad is that it expands students’ boundaries. “Students are forced out of their comfort zones by engaging people and practices in other cultures,” she said. “All medical practitioners will work in a multicultural world, and becoming sensitized to varied cultural differences will help them navigate complexities in patient-practitioner relationships.
“My goal in all of my education abroad experiences is for my students – and myself – to understand ourselves as connected to larger worlds of knowledge, histories, environments and peoples,” she continued. “I hope this gives students a sense of belonging and meaning.”
Schrift pointed out that although pre-health students are not qualified to practice medicine, they do often get opportunities to shadow physicians, take vitals, engage in public health education and help out as needed. One group that gets that type of hands-on experience is the student-led Global Brigade, which visits different countries each year to contribute to clinics for underserved populations.
Student experiences: Learning through global health
Aarna Patel, a junior Quillen Honors Scholar from Cleveland, Tennessee, has taken three health care-related education abroad trips within the last two years.
Patel, who is double-majoring in biomedical health sciences and world language with a concentration in Spanish and a minor in culture and health, participated in a medical humanities trip to the UK, which she said helped her to “understand the origins and complex ethical nature of historical research methods that led us to the medical field as we know it today. It helped me immensely to put into perspective how these anatomists, students, professors, prisoners and laypeople built the foundation for the field that I plan to pursue.”
She was a member of the first Destination Nawalgarh trip sponsored by ETSU’s College of Public Health and Global Handshakes. She and her fellow students became immersed in the culture of this small city in India by learning cultural arts like henna, fresco painting and pottery through local artisans. They also learned to connect with community members and understand their needs before deciding how to help them make improvements.
The education abroad experience that had the greatest impact on Patel was her first – the pilot Panama Medical Brigade trip led by ETSU’s Global Brigades chapter. Because she was the only student in the group who was studying Spanish, she ended up serving as an unofficial interpreter.
“I remember starting my Spanish studies too shy to hold conversations with my professors in my target language, but this experience fueled a continually growing passion for language as a tool to connect with and help others,” she said. “An elderly patient discovered that I could understand him during his consultation, and I could noticeably sense a shift in his demeanor – he became much more animated while explaining the roots of his joint problems and how they affected his daily activities as a rural farmer. I was amazed by the profound effect something as simple as speaking their language could have on patients, seeing how immediately they were put at ease and willing to participate in conversations about their health.
“While the other two courses certainly taught me a lot about health and medicine,” she continued, “the Medical Brigade really sparked the sense of purpose that finalized my decision to go into medicine and study to be a mindful, present and empowering provider for my future patients.”
Learn more about ETSU Education Abroad
The first step toward these valuable experiences is reaching out to ETSU Education Abroad, which is part of the university’s Center for Global Engagement. Explore program options in the Bucs Abroad portal. Attend an interest session to learn more about programs and locations, financial aid and scholarships, participation requirements and more.
Ready to take your education global? Explore ETSU’s health-focused study abroad programs today at ETSU Education Abroad.
