Page 12 - SAM September 2019

PUBLIC HEALTH

San Antonio medical students

share their perspectives

and experiences

By Matthew Hennessey, Alvin Boyd Newman-Caro,
Kaleigh Longcrier, and Hans Bruntmyer, DO

Matthew Hennessey asking “what can I do for you” it’s about the cases and vignettes with which students
The medical field has a call to help those asking, “what is your story.” It’s about going learn in those first two years, promote stu-
in need, but in a day and age where there is out into the patient’s world with no precon- dent’s conceptualization of patients as bio-
an increasing focus on the business of med- ceived notions but with listening ears. There logic puzzles rather than people. My
icine, there can often be gaps in the system are many days spent on the street just talk- experiences in Street Medicine-San Antonio
that leave certain populations wanting for ing to people, asking their name, listening have helped me to counter this dehuman-
care. Street Medicine aims to fill one of to their story. Street medicine exists even on izing habit of thinking. Through these ex-
those gaps by going directly to the streets days when there are no medical needs but periences I have been able to remind myself
to treat a group that is often marginalized simply just conversations. of the calling that drew me to medicine –
and undertreated, the unsheltered homeless caring for persons who are suffering, rather
population. Alvin B. Newman-Caro than solving a biologic puzzle.
The field of Street Medicine is one that Traditionally, medical education features When I befriended a homeless gentleman
has grown out of the need to simply meet a considerable emphasis, the first two years, who refused to seek medical treatment for
people where they are and lend a hand; but on the science of medicine. This emphasis his serious leg wound, I learned the impor-
this type of care is more than going out and is understandable given the complexity of tance of caring for a person holistically, as
performing first aid. Above all, Street Med- the human body and the increasingly com- opposed to remedying something that is
icine is about creating relationships with plex means by which physicians seek to broken in the body. His leg was severely
others, entering the patient’s world and in- treat diseases. But the scientific regard for necrotized, likely due to a venomous spider
teracting with them as equals. It’s not about patients, emphasized over and over again in bite and the wound was already infected. If

12 San Antonio Medicine • September 2019