These are stories directly from our volunteers and members.
For Karen Stolman, MD the motivation to complete her first global health volunteer assignment came from falling in love. “It started with falling in love with the country of Costa Rica, and having already visited and being fluent in Spanish,”…
Although 2018 Golden Apple Award Recipient Cynthia Howard, MD, MPHTM “had never really volunteered before,” when she first learned of HVO in 1996, the pediatrician already had ample experience practicing medicine in resource-scarce settings. “I had worked a bit abroad,”…
As a dermatology resident, Alexia Knapp, MD, seized upon the opportunity to complete a rotation at the Regional Dermatology Training Centre in Moshi, Tanzania. The experience sparked an enduring interest in global health and tropical medicine, which led to multiple…
Prakash Neupane, MD, a 2018 Golden Apple Award recipient, first heard about Health Volunteers Overseas during the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting several years ago. However, he was unsure if he would be able to complete an…
For International Nurses Day, guest blogger Amanda Judd, FNP, board member of One Nurse at a Time, shares an experience from abroad and calls on colleagues to make a commitment to global health and nurses worldwide by using knowledge to empower others.
Editor’s note: This post was adapted from a trip report written by HVO volunteer and leader Linda Wolff, MPT, summarizing her experience working as part of a team to deliver wheelchair service provision training to physical therapy providers in Thimphu, Bhutan.…
Editor’s Note: The following post was written by HVO staff member Kim Rodgers. Kim is the Volunteer Placement Coordinator for HVO’s dermatology program and works closely with on-site personnel at each of our dermatology project sites. Two of the dematologists…
The seed for the website Top Upgrade was planted during a month-long leadership training course for physical therapy professionals, which took place in Kigali, Rwanda in 2015 with support from HVO. During the course, participants were divided into groups of…
Jody Olsen, PhD, MSW, Chair of the HVO Board of Directors, writes this installment of Trends in Global Health, sharing a personal experience with using storytelling to identify the unique strengths and limitations that affect health systems in resource-scarce settings…
In October 2016, HVO volunteer and leader Linda Wolff, MPT shared her experience helping to deliver the World Health Organization’s Wheelchair Service Provision Training program in Thimphu, Bhutan with HVO blog readers. Ms. Wolff collaborated with an international team of…
“If you’re going along in your practice and you think you’ve done about everything you can ever get to do, why not try to push your envelope and volunteer with HVO.” These were the words that inspired 2017 Golden Apple…
Editor’s Note: This is the third and final post in a series written by Victoria Elliot, MSPH, a public health professional and medical student who accompanied HVO staff member April Pinner on a recent trip to Angkor Hospital for Children in Siem Reap, Cambodia.…