October 31, 1996
Project HEALTH is a public service program that allows 25 student volunteers to “witness the interconnectedness of major social ills while working to rectify them.”
-Rebecca Onie
It was not a conspicuous sign, in fact, I almost glanced over it, except that the word health caught my eye. Of course, as a pre-med, my subconscious is always alert to medical jargon, so I stopped. As it turned out, in this flyer health was not just a word, it was an acronym: H: helping E: empower A: advocate (and) L: lead T: through H: health, and this sign turned out to be more than just a flyer, it was to be my calling.
I joined Project HEALTH as a sophomore in the spring of 1996 as one of ten volunteers in a group of students who were to pilot this program. At that time, I didn’t know quite what to expect; in retrospect, I don’t think any of us did. Our mission was to use medicine as a forum through which we could adopt a multidisciplinary approach that integrated community service, social consciousness, and advocacy. That sounded impressive to me, and vaguely conjured up ideas and emotions with which I wanted to identify.
Our founder, Rebecca Onie, envisioned three components to the program: service, mentorship, and reflection. On paper, this meant that I would (1) be involved with a service project at Boston City Hospital, (2) be paired with a doctor who would serve as a mentor, and (3) engage in refection discussions every week with the group and with various guest speakers. In actuality, it meant that I would be thrust from my comfort zone into the world of inner-city poverty and frustration. It meant that I would board the No. 1 bus at least once a week and travel away from the Science Center, away from classes and concerns, and away from the sometimes insular world of academia to Boston City Hospital, a world on the other end of Mass. Ave where theory exists to be put into action, and where being a part of a team means sharing expertise and compassion with doctors, lawyers, social workers, development specialists, and interpreters (just to name a few) united in the common cause of helping others.
My specific project was to conduct a longitudinal study that would identify how the welfare changes being made by the state of Massachusetts were actually affecting the health of children. In order to quantify this abstract concept, I had to first educate myself on social policy and procedure and then attempt to design a survey that would effectively discern the information we needed from the parents of children brought into the emergency room. My mentor, Deborah Frank, who was, in fact, the founder of the Nutrition Surveillance Project, found that the number of malnourished children rose significantly during the winter months. This led to the discovery of the “heat or eat” effect, in which poor families have only enough money to heat their homes or to buy food and that during the winter months, they often go without food so that they don’t freeze to death.
This example is disturbing, but that is not to say that my experience was glum or disheartening. In fact, I would be tempted to say exactly the opposite. I was in the unique position of being able to see exactly how poverty is fought by the doctors. I was part of a team that collected data which was then used to lobby for change and to advocate on behalf of patients. It seems that nearly every week I met some patient or doctor who inspired me with their courage or dedication.
Every week we also met as group to vent our frustrations, to listen to each other and to experts, and to renew our faith and enthusiasm for what we were doing. The students that make up Project HEALTH have been incredibly inspiring to me. I have always been something of an idealist, but for the first time, I was talking with other students and with doctors and lawyers that saw the same visions of a better world and were willing to dedicate their lives to that cause. I have always wanted to be a doctor, and I have always been involved in public service and interested in social issues. Until Project HEALTH, however, I saw these components as separate parts of my life. At Boston City Hospital I have met several doctors that instead see these concerns as deeply integrated. In order to take care of their patients’ health, they try not only to alleviate suffering and to cure biological ills, but also to advocate for better social conditions. For instance, when a malnourished child would come into the pediatric emergency room, Dr. Deborah Frank would not simply give the child some food and send him or her home — this would only temporarily solve the problem. Often, the child would have no home to go to or no food to eat the next day. I remember one time when she took me up to the pediatric clinic to visit a patient and then proceeded to help the mother secure a place for the night at a shelter, reminded her how to apply for food stamps, inquired about her job training program, vouched for her absence at work, and countless other details that are so important yet so often overlooked.
I used to dream of going to Harvard Medical School and of practicing at one of the best teaching hospitals in the country, where I would apply the cutting edge in medical technology to my work. Now I think a lot more about my role not only as a doctor, but as a member of society, and how I must stay active in my commitment to helping others. I also think less often of the future and more often about the present. I am a member of society now, and although I will someday be a doctor, now I am a student, and now I can still contribute a lot. I may not yet have medical expertise, but I am gaining social awareness and can always offer my enthusiasm. I think that, perhaps, one of the best things about my experience with Project HEALTH is that in trying to help empower, advocate, and lead others through health, I have done the same for myself and have met several inspiring people who have done the same.