Immersive MD program fosters systemic change First cohort of Population-based Urban and Rural Community Health students become doctors By Kylee Denesha
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10 | SUMMER 2021
In line with the PURCH mission, the simulation is an interactive, interprofessional educational experience in which students truly learn what it means to be a member of a family living at or below the poverty line that illuminates some of the many social determinants of health that impact their patients. “You’re assessing how to get to work, pick up your kids from school, receive health care and buy groceries all without having access to transportation,” said Dr. Manikantan, now in her internal medicine residency at Stony Brook University Hospital in New York. “If you can’t make ends meet, you have to navigate the possibility of your house being foreclosed or checking your family into a homeless shelter. You make tough decisions, such as not getting groceries one week, then find ways to get services that could be of assistance.”
DAVE ROBACK
he first year of medical school brings lots of excitement for new students: getting to know professors and peers, taking foundational courses on core pharmacology concepts, and exploring the campus. For one group of School of Medicine Class of 2021 graduates, the first year also involved figuring out how to afford a month’s worth of meals and bus tickets for a family of three or four on an impossibly tight budget. “The poverty simulator threw us into realworld situations in our introductory weeks at UMass Medical School,” said Poornima Manikantan, MD’21. The Longmeadow native graduated with the inaugural class of students in the Population-based Urban and Rural Community Health (PURCH) track. “It was an opportunity to simulate the difficult decisions that many community members face daily.”
