Embracing diversity is central to Brown's mission across all of its programs. But the recruitment of medical students from a range of backgrounds can have a particular impact that extends outside of Brown.
Doctors today are responsible for treating an increasingly diverse patient population, and minority communities face a variety of challenges in navigating the health care system: language barriers, lack of insurance, mistrust of the medical profession, and the effects of unconscious bias.
In order to bridge these cultural divides and to accelerate the evolution of our physician workforce, the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University is committed to training aspiring physicians from underrepresented groups and giving them the resources they need to improve patient care.
One such student is Krissia Rivera Perla ’15 MD’21. Perla is the inaugural recipient of the Preston C. Calvert and Margaret E. Guerin-Calvert Medical Scholarship, which covers the cost of all four years of attendance for a highly promising medical student. Perla came to the United States from El Salvador when she was eight years old, and she was inspired by the doctors she met at the free clinic her mother brought her to as a child in Maryland.
In this video, she discusses her experience to date as a Brown medical student and her plans to parlay her education and skills into better care for patients across the cultural spectrum.
To learn more about establishing your own medical scholarship, please contact Cailie Burns, Associate Dean for Biomedical Advancement, at Cailie_Burns@brown.edu.