Knowledge About Healthy Living
A well known Chinese proverbs says “Give a man a fish, and you have fed him today, but teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” I add, “If you convince a man to teach others how to fish you will fed a nation.” These concepts of civic charity, community education and social responsibility have been the motivation for most of my professional and personal endeavors. Similarly, they have led to my interest in preventive medicine.
Overwhelmingly, my patients on the wards were afflicted with preventable diseases. For example, my first patient, a chronic smoker, died within a week of admission from a newly diagnosed Stage IV lung cancer. My first psychiatric patient was a teenager who was admitted with drug-related psychosis. Moreover, the flood of internal medicine patients admitted with a diagnosis of myocardial infarction or congestive heart failure exacerbation almost always had a medical history that included hypertension, dyslipidemia, diabetes type II and obesity. I found this situation to be quite disturbing. Therefore, I became determined to be a part of the fight to prevent such ailments.
This aspiration should come as no surprise considering my pattern of activism, research and education. From childhood I have been involved with various community drug prevention programs from writing and performing in skits at local elementary schools to working at a transitional home for addicts while in graduate school. My passion for teaching and service is made evident by my years as member of the National Association for the Prevention of Starvation where we planned and implemented programs for clean water, AIDS education, and healthy eating in several developing countries and the two years I spent teaching high school math and music in rural Guam. Other examples include, helping to organize a World AIDS Day health fair and candle light vigil, summer AIDS and malaria research and training at Korle-bu teaching hospital in Ghana, and working with the Student National Medical Association to recruit and mentor undergraduate minorities in careers in medicine.
I am excited about continuing these types of activities as a resident. I love teaching and look forward to training students and junior residents. My devotion to hard work and reliability will aid in honing my skills in making proper diagnoses and prescribing appropriate treatments. I hope to satisfy my voracious appetite for knowledge by contributing to faculty research throughout my residency training. I am optimistic that my contributions will lead to novel treatments, programs or policies that will reduce the prevalence of diseases like AIDS, obesity, and lung cancer. While I have found it fulfilling to treat these illnesses, i.e. give a man a fish, I have learned it is more beneficial to teach him how to live a lifestyle that prevents them, i.e. teach him to fish.
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