College Essay

My passion for people and medicine is the motivation that inspired my application to the Graduate School of Public Health. I have a firm conviction that the intimate nature of helping people make responsible decisions about their health, is what I am destined to do. I have always known that these motivations and convictions would take me into some kind of institution of higher education and now it is clear what I want to do when I get there. My immediate goals upon completion of the MPH at SDSU consist of two things, working to bring progressive change to underserved communities and continuing my education by going to medical school. With this knowledge and an MPH, I hope to serve as a primary care physician, working directly with segments of the population that most need understanding and culturally aware physicians. Eventually I would like to do the kind of work that is being done by people like Dr. Joseph Betancourt M.D. MPH of Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Betancourt's work specializes in understanding cross-cultural communication in healthcare and exploring root causes for racial/ethnic disparities in health as well as developing a framework of cultural competence as health policy. Dr. Betancourt's work combines the science of health with an understanding of society. In one study that he worked on that was just released by the National Academies' Institute of Medicine, it was found that racial disparities exist in healthcare and that what is needed is a social policy that sensitizes healthcare professional to the needs of minority populations. This far-reaching and thorough research is of the kind that I want to be associated with someday. I want to build the experience that will enable me to be a part of a social medicine that creates healthier, longer lives for all communities.
One of first times that I actually encountered public health in an academic arena was in a class entitled "AIDS, Science and Society". The scientific breakdown of the virus... [continues]

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