Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Medical School Students Get International Experience -- In The U.S.
An Iraqi refugee and a medical student sat in a community center in suburban Denver, passing an orange plastic bottle of pills back and forth. The vial's contents rattled like a syncopated soundtrack for their conversation. With help from an Arabic translator at Aza, University of Colorado student Marissa Hudak determined that the woman had mixed all her medications in the bottle. She was no longer sure which pill was for her thyroid ailment, for her joint pain or for her stomach problems that were particularly troubling that day. Hudak promised to call the woman's doctor to try to straighten things out. (Bryson, 5/9)
For more than a century, medical education in the United States has meant learning how to practice medicine and how to do research to make medicine better. But that could be changing. Given the need for more primary-care physicians, the shortage of certain specialists, and the belief that medical schools boost local economies, 36 institutions have opened across the country in the last 20 years. (Rush, 5/10)