Class Of 2024

Pregnancy Aid Clinic, College Park, MD

Applied Experience, Spring 2023

Briefly describe what you did for your Applied Experience and any highlights.

For my applied experience, I worked at the Pregnancy Aid Clinic, a government-funded clinic in College Park. Through the experience, I learned a lot about the healthcare system in Maryland, especially for women on government aid pursuing contraceptive options. Through shadowing the providers and helping with insurance calls for patients, I got to firsthand witness a side of healthcare that I would have never gotten to see had I not been able to do the applied experience.

How has your experience informed your understanding of public health?

My experience was integral in forming my understanding of public health. I had only had exposure to the field through my coursework and lectures, but interacting with content that we were learning in class in a hands-on environment made my understanding of the field all the stronger. I believe that this component of the Public Health Studies major is so special and got me even more excited about reproductive health, a concentration of public health that is of great interest to me.

How does this experience align with your future goals?

As I apply to medical school now, I feel that my applied experience shaped a more well-rounded understanding of medicine for me. The experience has allowed me to see not only the direct patient care side of working at an underfunded clinic, but also an administrative that deals with providing support for patients in other ways, such as working through their insurance needs and crafting lifestyle plans for them that go beyond clinical care.

How do you think your time at JHU prepared you for this work?

My time at JHU prepared me for this work by allowing me a different perspective on healthcare. A lot of students, especially those pursuing a career in medicine, have a clinical and physiological background that shapes their interest. With the public health major as a whole, my interest in medicine goes beyond the scope of simply the classroom or the clinical setting and acknowledges the side of medicine that focuses on holistic patient care and the innerworkings of the healthcare system.