Student Profiles

Melanie Hosker

In March 2009, I traveled to Haiti on a medical team.  During the two weeks our team traveled from Port-au-Prince, north to St. Michel and south to Jacmel.  We saw over 1,000 people at five medical clinics (with only a total of 14 team members- five trained medical providers). Patient conditions ranged from basic headaches, cold, and mild malnutrition to severely infected wounds, hypertension, and end stages of diabetes.  On this team, I was able to experience life in a country where I wish to potentially work in the future (for the second time- my first trip in 2007).  I used this trip to compliment an independent study, with Dr. Glendene Lemard, focusing on the ways in which culture, politics and environment inhibit health care improvements in Haiti.  The most valuable part of this experience, which I plan to take with me no matter what career I end up in, is:   Not everything, especially health, can be looked at linearly.  Public health requires a multidimensional approach to truly ease the issue at hand. 

“[Since] we don’t necessarily have good responses to the root causes of poverty and social inequality, we have to take on the symptoms at the same time”(- Farmer- The Uses of Haiti p. 158)

This upcoming year I will be studying in Kenya and Rwanda (August 2009- July 2010).  I will be spending both academic semesters in Kenya and the winter and summer session in Rwanda.