this essay is for a summer program
As a young girl in India, I remember tagging along with my parents to rural villages in India. Due to the fact that adequate healthcare was lacking for the residents in these impoverished and marginalized areas, my parents would often participate in sponsoring health camps for these villages. The villagers relied mostly on farming as their source of income, were hardly able to afford quality healthcare, and some even lived in slums. Many of the patients were little children around my age, and suffered from pneumonia or other diseases caused by either lack of proper nourishment, exposure to pathogens, or by simply living in unhygienic environments. The patients who received care from my parents clearly received physical benefit from medical treatment. However, I also began to realize that ideal, effective medical care does not only consist of the improvement of patients' health. Rather, it should also entail thoughtful, attentive, and creative consideration of the other aspects of patients' lives, including the communities in which they live in, the level of support available to them, and their economic resources.
Drawing from my memories of these villages and its residents, I am an ardent believer of helping those that do not have access to health care or cannot afford it. By participating in a few health fairs in the South Asian Community during junior high school, I was able to witness the effects of individuals not receiving adequate healthcare. The patients that attended this fair were unable to pay for health insurance, and as a result had not visited a doctor since emigrating to the U.S. Many of the patients suffered from high cholesterol and severe atherosclerosis and, even worse, were unaware of it. Furthermore, they were uneducated in regard to the dangers of having these types of diseases. Many patients had not even received routine blood tests in years. Being a part of these health fairs opened my eyes to the grave risks involved to the lives of those who are not provided with sufficient and reasonably priced health care.
My experiences have led me to deem that it is a responsibility for everyone associated with the health care field to extend quality health care to those who need it, regardless of background, financial status, etc. Healthcare, afterall, is an essential human right. As an aspiring physician, I strongly aim to provide satisfactory health care to people in rural villages in India, similar to the ones I remember visiting as child, as well as the underserved populations in the U.S. I also wish to establish facilities for these types of communities in India so that populations in villages are able to live healthful and quality lives.
As a young girl in India, I remember tagging along with my parents to rural villages in India. Due to the fact that adequate healthcare was lacking for the residents in these impoverished and marginalized areas, my parents would often participate in sponsoring health camps for these villages. The villagers relied mostly on farming as their source of income, were hardly able to afford quality healthcare, and some even lived in slums. Many of the patients were little children around my age, and suffered from pneumonia or other diseases caused by either lack of proper nourishment, exposure to pathogens, or by simply living in unhygienic environments. The patients who received care from my parents clearly received physical benefit from medical treatment. However, I also began to realize that ideal, effective medical care does not only consist of the improvement of patients' health. Rather, it should also entail thoughtful, attentive, and creative consideration of the other aspects of patients' lives, including the communities in which they live in, the level of support available to them, and their economic resources.
Drawing from my memories of these villages and its residents, I am an ardent believer of helping those that do not have access to health care or cannot afford it. By participating in a few health fairs in the South Asian Community during junior high school, I was able to witness the effects of individuals not receiving adequate healthcare. The patients that attended this fair were unable to pay for health insurance, and as a result had not visited a doctor since emigrating to the U.S. Many of the patients suffered from high cholesterol and severe atherosclerosis and, even worse, were unaware of it. Furthermore, they were uneducated in regard to the dangers of having these types of diseases. Many patients had not even received routine blood tests in years. Being a part of these health fairs opened my eyes to the grave risks involved to the lives of those who are not provided with sufficient and reasonably priced health care.
My experiences have led me to deem that it is a responsibility for everyone associated with the health care field to extend quality health care to those who need it, regardless of background, financial status, etc. Healthcare, afterall, is an essential human right. As an aspiring physician, I strongly aim to provide satisfactory health care to people in rural villages in India, similar to the ones I remember visiting as child, as well as the underserved populations in the U.S. I also wish to establish facilities for these types of communities in India so that populations in villages are able to live healthful and quality lives.