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MSIH Alumni Give Back Providing Advice & Guidance

MSIH alumni give back in so many ways, including providing advice and guidance to current MSIH students. In less than three months, more than twenty MSIH alums have been guest lecturers at MSIH. In addition to lecturing on global health topics, they have shared wisdom about elective and residency planning. They have also talked about their experiences in various specialties, from pediatrics to family medicine, anesthesiology, oncology and many more. These topics covered will help guide our students as they prepare for residency and beyond.

In the second of this two part series, we will highlight some of the alumni who served as guest lecturers, providing both advice and a glimpse into their roles as medical practioners.

Elective & Residency Planning

MSIH alumni have recently held several elective and residency planning talks for students. Benjamin Courchia, M.D. (Class of 2013), is a Pediatrician, and is the Director of the Neonatal Innovation Program at Envision Health and HCA University Hospital in Florida. Dr. Courchia also co-hosts a weekly podcast focusing on neonatal care called The Incubator.  During his lecture, he shared advice on how students can excel in their electives in the U.S. He discussed how they can add value to healthcare teams as a rotator, make patient consults, and so forth. He also recommended textbooks, tools for students to use, and much more.

Jonathan Abres, M.D. (Class of 2021), is a first-year resident in Family Medicine/Urban Medicine at the University of Rochester in New York. As a very recent graduate, he provided timely information about the process. During his lecture, he reviewed an approach to abdominal and chest pain, including a review of patient presentations and history taking.

Specialties

One of the most important decisions medical students make is which specialty to choose. Many factors go into this decision, including personal history, clinical interests, experience during rotations, the duration of the training involved and financial and lifestyle considerations.  At MSIH, students have clinical exposure in the first two years, but it is in the third year when their clinical clerkships may serve to reinforce their specialty choice or expose them to something new. Regardless of whether or not a student is leaning towards a particular specialty or not, MSIH alumni are instrumental in providing real world perspectives on various specialties. Since January, MSIH alumni who specialize in emergency medicine, obstetrics/gynecology, pediatrics, psychiatry, anesthesiology, geriatrics, surgery, oncology, internal medicine and family medicine, have shared their experiences with current students. These alumni practice in the U.S., Canada, Israel and in other countries worldwide.

Asaf Harris, M.D. (Class of 2017) shared his experiences as an Internal Medicine Hospitalist in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Dr. Harris enjoys the challenge of treating complicated patients and told the students that his “work is interesting and varied. Being in the hospital, he works in acute internal medicine where he assesses, investigates, diagnoses and manages patients with conditions that may exhibit severe symptoms that develop quickly and can be life-threatening. He also discussed his unique schedule, as Dr. Harris works a 7/7 schedule (7 am – 7 pm for 7 days in a row, followed by being off for 7 days).

The advice and guidance that MSIH alumni give to current students is invaluable and truly compliments the advising they receive from faculty and staff. As they pass on words of wisdom they also serve to inspire our future doctors!

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