New York is the most cosmopolitan city in the United States, and Northern Manhattan and the Bronx (from which many of our patients are drawn) exemplify that diversity. People from literally all over the world, or who have traveled all over the world, come through Columbia’s doors. If you’re interested in global health or tropical medicine, no other institution in America can provide the same in-house exposure—coupled, of course, with Columbia’s state-of-the-art facilities, technology, education and training. By sheer virtue of being a quaternary hospital located in New York and of having many international referrals, P&S truly brings the world to its students.
Millennium Villages Project
Sonia Sachs, M.D. ss2632@columbia.edu Through the Columbia University Earth Institute and Professor Jeffrey Sachs’ Millennium Villages Project, first year students in the summer, and fourth year students through electives and who are interested in the intersection between health and development are placed at the Millennium Village sites across Africa. Students are sent to a rural village setting of an underdeveloped country that lacks basic health and disease prevention infrastructure. They work with a team surveying health related needs and implementing infrastructure for health care delivery, health education, and disease prevention.
Ben Gurion University in the Negev: a Medical School for International Health
Val Ambrose va2134@columbia.edu In 1996, Columbia University and Ben-Gurion University initiated an international collaboration in global health medical education, establishing the first four year, American-style medical degree taught in English and incorporating global health in all four years of the medical curriculum, known as the Medical School for International Health (MSIH).
Fourth year students at P&S may pursue elective options with Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. They are sent to Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Faculty of Health Sciences, in Beer Sheva, Israel and have opportunities to visit international clinical sites for the Medical School for International Health in India, Ethiopia, Kenya, Peru, Vietnam, and Nepal. These are structured, eight- week, international clerkships with a small group of MSIH students working under the supervision of local, MSIH-approved, preceptors.
Tropical Medicine and International Electives 4th year
Val Amrbose,va2134@columbia.edu In addition to being one of the only medical schools in the country with a required parasitology course in the second year, P&S students have a formal tropical medicine elective they make take at any site in the developing world. Run by Dr. Dickson Despommier, students have excellent preceptorship in identifying sites and finding funding to go abroad. Many do clerkships in specialties like neurosurgery, trauma surgery, OB-GYN, infectious disease, HIV care, radiology, neurology, and pediatrics. Columbia strongly believes that international health embraces every medical specialty. Countries run the gamut from Swaziland to Switzerland.
First Year Summer Opportunities
In addition to the Millennium Villages clerkship, first year students have formal opportunities at Columbia to go abroad.
- Students interested in health systems are offered the American Council Fellowship to St. Luke’s International Hospital in Tokyo, Japan: up to two P&S students are selected each year to spend a summer rotating through departments of their choice (surgery, medicine) in a technologically equipped high-volume hospital.
- Students interested in AIDS work and community health are offered opportunities to rotate with Dr. Nicholas Cunningham in the Family AIDS Program in La Romana, Dominican Republic. Besides opportunities to work in HIV clinical care, health education and advocacy in populations ranging from sex workers to children, housing is provided on-site in “Casa
Columbia.” - Dr. Scott Hammer, Chief of Infectious Diseases, brings students to his clinics in Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Durban, South Africa to clinically work on the intersection between tuberculosis and HIV.
- Students may also elect to collaborate with faculty members on research abroad. P&S faculty have an extraordinary breadth of global involvement. From conducting cutting-edge bench and clinical research at foreign institutions to providing health services to some of the world’s most isolated populations, faculty in departments from Psychiatry to Pediatrics to Head & Neck Surgery work overseas. At last count faculty were involved in 67 countries on a variety of projects, and nearly all welcome student involvement.
- Lastly, the P&S Club’s International Health Organization helps students identify oppportunities for summer abroad after their first year. Popular options include Medical Spanish immersion programs, public health practica and visiting hospitals where previous P&S students have worked. Of course, many students choose to blaze their own trails!
Mailman School of Public Health
P&S is lucky to have the world-renowned Mailman School of Public Health literally next door. In addition to pursing an MPH degree, P&S students may take advantage of the wealth of global opportunities the School offers. Students are allowed to take 1 course a year free at the School (or any other School of Columbia University, including the School of International and Public Affairs), and Mailman has a rich network of contacts and practica available to medical students.
In New York
Many of the world’s leading medical NGOs are headquartered in New York, including the International Rescue Committee, Doctors Without Borders (MSF)- USA, Human Rights Watch, the Population Council, as well as the United Nations Organizations (UNICEF, UNAIDS, etc). P&S faculty are often affiliated with these organizations, and interested students can pursue internships or other opportunities.