Faculty Reflections on International Travel to Reach the Medically Underserved

Abstract

One approach to preparing students to engage in culturally diverse health-care settings around the world is to incorporate faculty-led short-term cultural immersion programs in medically underserved nations. This reflective summary analyzes the impact of a faculty-led international health-care trip on students' global health-care experience and needed health-care services in developing countries. A content analysis of the journals of two advanced practice registered nurse (APRN) faculty members was performed to gain perspectives on a trip with undergraduate and graduate nursing students and medical students to a small city in Nicaragua. This article examines the personal and professional growth achieved, and the challenges faced, when managing acute and chronic diseases with limited resources in an unfamiliar country. Themes identified included anxieties of planning, provider versus faculty role, students in action, networking, nurturing behaviors, advocating, and mentoring self-sustainability. Faculty-led international health-care trips both add a needed service to developing countries' health-care needs and offer students the experience of health care from a global perspective.