During their time at Boston Medical Center, BUSM students are allowed the unique opportunity to serve a patient population that is reportedly 70% underserved and includes patients who may be low-income, immigrants, non-English speaking, or some combination of all three. The health of these patients is often intimately tied to social, economic, or other non-biomedical circumstances, requiring their medical teams to craft a treatment plan that accommodates these social needs. While health care providers are well trained to address medical issues, this elective is designed to provide more intensive training around social determinants of health and the various ways physicians can advocate for social change to improve the lives of their patients. This elective will focus on helping medical students explore the social determinants of health and how physicians can assess and manage these social determinants of health as part of an inter-professional team. The main faculty mentor will be Dr. Megan Sandel, MD, MPH, who will meet with each student and help to coordinate the clinical setting in which the student will spend the four week block. Students will spend 50-75% of their time in this clinical setting or community based organization devoted to underserved patients (examples include Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Program; GROW clinic, or Project RESPECT Clinic). Students, in collaboration with Dr. Sandel, will choose a BMC faculty mentor at their clinical site who is invested in patient advocacy and a subject expert in the student’s area of interest. The other 25-50% of time will be spent doing an advocacy focused research or intervention project. Details of the elective must be worked out in a meeting with Dr. Sandel at least 1 month prior to the start of the elective block.

Note that this information may change at any time. Please visit the MyBU Student Portal for the most up-to-date course information.