Global Health Program Students Support COVID-19 Efforts Through New Elective
- Apr 3, 2020
After the sudden cancellation of their plans to work with medical facilities in Kenya this spring, 27 residents in the Dell Medical School are now contributing their skills to support the healthcare needs of the Austin community through a new Global Health Program elective course—The COVID-19 Pandemic: Global Health on the Front Lines.
The Global Health Program is a collaboration between Texas Global and Dell Med that combines education, research and service to advance health equity worldwide. Dr. Tim Mercer, a Dell Med faculty member and the director of Global Health, would have led the program in Kenya. He wanted to find an alternative learning experience for his senior medical students who were now without a course.
“It’s been really important to us that we balance, for our students, their education with their ability to meaningfully contribute to the response,” Mercer said. “I thought, well, why don’t we have them learn about the COVID-19 pandemic in real time.”
The COVID-19 elective has space for student reflection and engaging with the pandemic on the human level, says Global Health Program Coordinator Sarayu Adeni.
“We wanted to answer how to best take advantage of this real-life opportunity to study global health when it comes to your doorstep,” Adeni said.
Read the full article on UT News.
