Vivian Nguyen holds one of her newest patients in a remote hospital in the African country of Niger. Her OSU internship is part of the College of Pharmacy's effort to help future pharmacists recognize their ethical obligations in the medical field.

“So much need” for rural health care and those in underserved populations is changing the way Oregon State is training its College of Pharmacy students.

“A big world out there needs our help,” said Ann Zweber, an instructor of pharmacy education who is working in OSU’s outreach programs in Oregon and throughout the world. “The challenge is great.”

Zweber wrote a recent report challenging pharmacy colleges across the nation to become more aggressive in training and involving their students in the “front line” of medicine, reaching out to underserved populations, those with little insurance, special needs, low income or minority groups.

“For many people, pharmacies provide the first — and sometimes the only — health care they get, when they can’t afford to see a doctor, travel long distances or pay for medications. We want our students to understand these issues, realize their ethical obligations and get involved,” Zweber said.

She was a member of a recent national task force on “caring for the underserved,” which published its findings in the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education.

“Pharmacy graduates must not only have the knowledge, attitudes and skills to provide quality pharmaceutical care,” task force members wrote in their report. “They must care enough to proactively seek opportunities to render that care to the disenfranchised and forgotten people within our society.”

Even in urban areas, Zweber said, pharmacists are now frequently involved in immunization programs, health screenings, medication therapy management, dispensing products and advice, and helping patients learn about and sometimes wade through the maze of bureaucracy to access some health assistance programs.

In rural or remote areas, the demands can go far beyond that. Cultural factors, language, literacy and disabilities can all become roadblocks to care.

Such initiatives have been an increasing part of OSU’s pharmacy instruction programs in recent years. Every student is required to do at least one six-week rotation in an underserved setting or community.

Some students work with Mid-Valley Housing Plus, helping mental health patients with their medication management. Many participate in a workshop that teaches “Spanish for pharmacists.”

“We don’t want our students going through college in a bubble, unaware of what’s going on in the outside world,” Zweber said. “We see them developing a sense of obligation to serve people, do volunteer work, give back to the community. It’s not easy; it takes a lot of time and effort to balance a community project with a final exam. But it’s worth it.”

~ by David Stauth and Ed Curtin

With a head scarf as colorful as the surroundings, Vivian Nguyen inoculates an infant held by its mother. Nguyen, a Portland resident, urges Oregonians to support health care efforts in impoverished countries.

GALMI, West Africa – Vivian Nguyen was expecting “culture shock” when she went to a remote hospital in Niger as part of a college outreach program – most people were poor, had no running water, electricity or bathrooms, and they lived in mud huts. She knew that going in.

But by the time she was helping to deal with fatal burn cases, struggle against an AIDS epidemic, and hold a diseased leg steady while a surgeon sawed it off, the Portland, Ore., resident said she also was experiencing a little “medical shock.” At Galmi Hospital, being overwhelmed with desperate patients was a daily event.

“The hospital was what you would have found in the United States 100 years ago, except they have penicillin,” said Nguyen, a student in the College of Pharmacy at Oregon State University. “Surgeons operate with headlamps in case the electricity goes out. People there die every day of things that you could never imagine seeing today in the U.S., like cholera, malaria, typhoid and tetanus.”

The experience was part of what OSU, and increasing numbers of pharmacy programs all over the country, are trying to help more students understand – the immediate and sometimes desperate needs of underserved populations, and the role that pharmacists on the front lines can play to help address that.

In Oregon, that might include working in a rural outreach program, learning to provide vaccinations, or helping break through language or cultural barriers. In other parts of the world, the experience can be more extreme.

“One man was paralyzed from the neck down when a brick wall fell on him, and there was nothing we could do,” Nguyen said. “Sometimes there were no surgeons, and children with advanced typhoid disease had to be sent home to die because there was no one within 300 miles able to perform an intestinal operation.”

Other volunteer medical experts, besides Nguyen, also experienced “medical shock.” She would make rounds with doctors and offer drug prescription and dosing recommendations, not necessarily based on what the doctor wanted or was optimal for the patient, but based on what was available and might be able to help.

She went to local villages, teaching malnourished people how to treat lice, scabies and worms. She vaccinated babies to prevent polio. She worked at the HIV clinic.

“It is often easy to focus solely on the healthcare issues here at home and forget how millions of people live around the world,” Nguyen said. “I hope more people will donate to organizations working in these areas, or go themselves to help make a difference.”

~ by David Stauth

President Ed Ray shakes hands with OSU alumnus Hosung Chang, president of Dankook University.

On Wednesday, June 25, Oregon State University President Ed Ray met with a delegation of three people from Dankook University in South Korea. The delegation was led by Hosung Chang, who is president of Dankook, an OSU alumnus, and president of an OSU-Korea alumni group.

Chang visited OSU to meet Ray, signed a memorandum of understanding, and met OSU faculty and staff to discuss Korean alumni relations, possible English language opportunities for Dankook students, and possible summer Engineering internships for OSU and Dankook students.

“We are pleased to sign the MOU with Dankook University to strengthen the relationship between our universities,” Ray said. “This visit takes on special meaning as…the delegation led by Dr. Chang marks the beginning of a new partnership to connect with Korean OSU alumni.”

Chang spoke with emotion about the gratitude that he and other alumnus feel for the support and guidance they received from their OSU faculty during their graduate studies. He spoke about the positive difference made by financial support in the form of assistantships and about the overall value of a U.S. education.

Dankook University is a private university in South Korea. There are two main campus locations:  Jukjeon and Cheonan. The Jukjeon campus boasts technologically advanced classrooms, high-end facilities, ample dorm space and one of Korea’s most aesthetically beautiful university campuses. There is an extension campus in Cheonan, a city in South Chungcheong province, which sits on the face of beautiful hills and a lake and includes the largest hospital in the region, as well as the only four-year Mongolian Language and Literature Department in Korea. According to Wikipedia, the university hosts a student body of about 20,000, and employs about 630 instructors.

Chang received a MS (1985) and PhD (1993) in Electrical Engineering from OSU. He has facilitated more than $10,000 in gifts from the Korean Alumni Association. Ten Korean students have been identified who are either outstanding academically or have financial need. They will each receive $1,000 for Fall 2008.

The Korean Students Association of Oregon State University was founded in 1971 and has been active ever since.

OSU had 91 students from South Korea enrolled for fall 2007, approximately two-thirds are graduate students. Oregon State has 211 Korean alumni, 100 of whom are located in Seoul proper.