GLOBAL HEALTH SPOTLIGHT
TO GHANA AND BACK A MEDICAL STUDENT’S LIFE-CHANGING EXPERIENCE Evelyn Quist, Class of 2019, was feeling pressure to decide about what field of medicine to pursue as the fourth-year residency application cycle loomed on the horizon. The answer came in January 2018 on a medical outreach trip she organized to Ghana’s capital, Accra, the city where she grew up. Quist partnered with Doctors in the Gap, an organization that provides limited medical care in remote regions. She and her team provided medical care at a Christian government hospital and at a makeshift clinic on remote Hope Island. Speaking to patients in Ewe, her native language, Quist checked vitals, took medical histories and decided on a course of action between medical treatment, counseling and education. “The experience was life-changing,” she says. “It cemented my decision to go into family medicine. I was seeing everyone, from small children to middle-aged and older people. I could see that family medicine would give me the training to cater to the full spectrum of patients and address each age group’s concerns.” Quist is also pursuing a master of business administration degree since she hopes to return to Ghana one day to build a network of community clinics that provide health care as well as health education and community events. “Our medical system in Ghana is subpar in certain regions of the country, and I believe the people of Ghana are capable of making it better,” she says. Quist has gone on other medical outreach trips “to give
Evelyn Quist, Class of 2019, left, examining a farmer on Hope Island, Ghana, who presented with general body aches and fatigue.
BY MARK SOMMER
something back.” After her second year of medical school, she spent a week with a UB medical team in Fontaine, Haiti. As an undergraduate, she spent two weeks in a rural region of Honduras doing intake, checking vitals, assisting with physical exams and developing patients’ medical histories. Traveling as a medical student has fueled her interest in global health. “You hear about all these places with strife, but it’s not until you’re on the ground and see it with your own eyes that it has a significant impact on you,” Quist says. “It’s easy to just watch something on TV and think, ‘I feel bad about this situation.’ But experiencing it firsthand gives a different meaning and a different awareness. It stays with you and motivates you always.” In December 2018, working with Ghanaian native Dorothy Siaw-Asamoah, PhD, MBA, clinical assistant professor in the UB School of Management, Quist returned to Ghana with a team of faculty and students in medicine, nursing, pharmacy and public health, some of whom are also pursuing an MBA degree. In addition to providing medical care to inner-city elementary and middle school students, the team returned to Hope Island, where they slept in tents for four days and saw more than 1,000 patients. “The selflessness, bravery and kindness shown by members of the medical team I served alongside—and by the people we provided medical care for—continues to fuel me to do more and to do better,” says Quist. “I’m already looking forward to the next medical trip in 2019.”
SPRING 2019
UB MEDICINE
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