For this journey a medical team consisting of physicians, medical students and APPs will be backpacking through the remote communities that call the Himalayan Mountain range in northern India their home. Some of the villages we will be setting up tent style clinics are located at 14,000 to 15,000 feet above sea level. Due to the extreme location of these communities, some villages are only accessible by foot. This creates a challenge for the local population to access modern medical care when in need.
The population we will be serving is the local North Indian communities of the Himalayan Mountain range. These populations have a wide range of physical conditions and elevations anywhere between 4,000 and 15,000 feet above sea level. It is because of this extreme remoteness that we choose to serve this population and provide medical care that would otherwise be inaccessible to local population.
This is an established expedition through Himalayan Health Exchange. As such our upcoming trip will help to reinforce the bonds created between the mountainous village populations and the medical providers who journey to serve them. These communities have limited access to medical care, sometimes spending multiple months isolated from ground travel due to weather hazards.
Personally, I believe this expedition will help make me a better Emergency Medicine physician. Through the exposure to a diverse patient population with pathologies less commonly seen in the United States I will improve my clinical skills. Additionally, becoming proficient in providing medical care across language barriers is a skill that is important in the ever increasing global community.
Our team helped provide primary care and other basic medical services to many remote communities in northern India within the Himalayan mountain range.
