It has been almost two years since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. This global health crisis continues to expose the vulnerabilities of health systems worldwide, especially in low- and middle-income countries such as the Philippines. While advanced hospital-based health care is required in treating the life-threatening complications of severe COVID-19, it is a

The time reads 8:30 am. Walking down the pediatric wards as a third-year medical student, it is easy to get lost in the routine. Step by step with the rest of the medical team on morning rounds, I report an elevated direct bilirubin outside the patient room of a young newborn whose liver is looking a little “junky” to say the least. “His belly is soft and non-distended,” I report.

Matamoros, Mexico: The living conditions of displaced migrants Poverty, violence, natural disasters, and political instability are all forces that have led to mass migration and displaced populations globally. In the Americas, migrants crossing from Honduras into Mexico face a number of personal safety and health concerns, including a high risk of sex trafficking, ...

“There was so much information out there, I didn’t know what to do. I just wish someone had convinced me to get the vaccine,” said a COVID-19 patient we cared for a few days after he had been transferred to the intensive care unit (ICU). Each day, we slowly turned up his oxygen. Each day, he could only manage a few words at a time as the virus, that has come to dominate all of our lives, ravaged his lungs. Every patient we have had in the ICU with COVID-19 in the last ...

Medication abortion is a common and important part of primary care…and access to safe abortion care will likely soon be made either harder or easier, depending on the state in which you live. The example of SB 8 in Texas is the most extreme currently, where no one can access an abortion in Texas if they are more than ...

California of the pioneers, peopled by progressives of campsites with bear lockers of pines and berries of easy cilantro in markets of walnut milk of ocean vistas and Apple of fires in the woods. Our tribal health community “We want you to trust us with your primary health care,” I tell the 60-year-old patient whose body mass index (BMI) is just past obese. He is a native man who studied the classics in college and has been working on a book for 25 years. He lives with two sons ...

Housing and food insecurity have always existed in Massachusetts, but the pandemic has exacerbated these issues. Cambridge Health Alliance (CHA), an academic community health system serving Cambridge, Somerville, and Boston’s metro-north region, has witnessed this firsthand and is addressing the nutritional and housing needs of patients by connecting them to community-based support through the MassHealth Flexible Services Program. The

When my fellow Harvard Medical School classmates asked “what I was up to,” I called it my Rural Family Medicine Adventure Month. More formally, it was my extreme privilege and pleasure to learn Family Medicine across northern Maine and western Massachusetts as part of an independent study in rural primary care in June 2021. My travels brought me to the Jackman Community Health Center, the Northern Maine Medical Center, the Barre Family Health Center, the Behavioral Health Network Methadone Clinic, and the Community Health Center of Franklin County. I explored the ...

As the largest system for primary care in the United States, federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) (and other community health centers) stand in a unique position to redress the