I am a third year Internal Medicine resident at Mount Sinai Hospital who will be traveling to Dhulikel, Nepal as part of the organization AMPATH. I will be learning about healthcare in Nepal and community health practices from the medicine providers at Dhulikel Community Hospital by observing them during rounds and clinic and offering my help and insight when appropriate. AMPATH is a global network of academic health centers and universities which fosters improvements in medicine and population health through partnership and exchange. This exchange will benefit all parties involved. I will learn from the community healthcare model that Dhulikel embodies and observe medicine practiced in a lower resource setting. Through this exchange I will also be able to share my own medical experience and perspective with the Nepali providers that I will be working with, namely internal medicine residents and hospitalists.
I will be assisting at Dhulikel Hospital which serves 2.5 million Nepali people who live in the surrounding regions, many of which are rural and low income.
The impact of the AMPATH is longitudinal in nature and based on learning that occurs as a result of the bilateral exchanges between faculty, staff, residents, and students. As a resident who plans to go into primary care and preventive medicine with a focus on population health, learning about the practices of a successful community hospital in Nepal is relevant to my future career and the care I will provide for my future patients. This exchange naturally goes both ways and my hospital hosted a Nepali medical student in October 2023. The student joined our inpatient medicine team and I had the opportunity to work with them directly in my capacity as a senior resident. Among things we discussed were prevalent chronic diseases in New York City and the more deferential nature of the patient-doctor relationship in Nepal compared to the United States.
In Nepal I had the opportunity to observe attending and resident Internal Medicine physicians provide high quality care despite having significantly fewer resources at their disposal than where I practice. This experience broadened my fund of knowledge, particularly in skills such as the physical exam which has such high importance in the practice of Nepali medicine. I also worked with an attending who was beginning Dhulikel Hospital’s first antimicrobial stewardship program. By working with this attending, I was able to be involved in setting up this important initiative. Along the way I was also able to share my own clinical experiences and knowledge from my training at a New York Hospital with Nepali residents and attendings. Through my experience I witnessed the importance of encouraging cross cultural exchanges of ideas and practices.
