Return to Main Menu

Choi gains public health experience, advocates change by Cindy Abole Public Relations Around MUSC’s campus, Ricky Choi has evolved from a medical student to a leader, defender, reformer and voice for positive change. So what does a bright, charismatic 26-year-old Columbia native do at the height of his clinical training and academic experiences?  Between his third and fourth year of medical school, Choi took a year off, interrupting his studies and practice rotations, to pursue a master's degree in public health from Harvard University. For a talented few, it is a sidestep in a calculated career path ensuring credibility and a chance for greater possibilities. For Choi, it was that and much more. It was his opportunity of a lifetime.  COM student Ricky Choi and others rally for universal health care at the 2001 AMSA National Convention in Houston. “I saw this as a chance for me to engage in national and international public health issues which would, in turn, enrich my emerging role as a practicing physician,” said Choi. “Furthermore, I'm interested in making an innovative impact in medicine and public health. I saw Harvard as the best place in the world for learning about how to effect a change.” He found the Ivy League environment  enriched with bold ideas, provocative dialogue and fresh perspectives satisfying to his inquisitiveness. Choi valued the interaction between classmates, faculty, visiting scholars and other individuals. In addition to learning from their field of expertise, thought processes and insight, he learned from the personal decisions, experiences and thought processes that led them to success.  Program students represent more than a dozen  nations including China, India, Switzerland, Germany, Australia and the United Kingdom. About 70 percent of students  in the MPH program are physicians who chose to commit their careers toward public health or wanted to incorporate public health tools to make a greater impact within communities. “The Harvard School of Public Health is involved in cutting-edge public health practice,” Choi said, of the respected faculty composed of world leaders, practitioners and global health pioneers. “The questions faculty asked, discussed and challenged us with were the very same questions they posed themselves in their research and investigations. Engaging the frontiers of public health, the faculty were actually seeking collaboration with us. It's an environment so contagious that it becomes part of you. I discovered how much I valued being part of that type of learning environment.” Compared to other public health schools, Harvard’s core curriculum is standard, offering courses in epi-demiology, biostatistics, health policy and other basic sciences of public health. Unlike many programs, the courses are taught by the textbooks'  authors, broadening a student's classroom experience. Harvard consistently host guest speakers who are at the frontier of change in making the biggest impact in public health. Choi enriched his academic experience cross-registering classes at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and nearby Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Choi believes that the issues involving global public health and international health conditions are not stressed enough to the American public and health care students in particular. While at MUSC, he participated with interdisciplinary student teams as a medical volunteer working in Nicaragua and Ghana, West Africa. “We’re all very much interested in what goes on in the local community that we see as relevant to us. But when we put things in perspective and consider, for example, how some 90 percent of our country's medical research dollars go to only 10 percent of the world's medical problems, it has to make us question our priorities,” Choi said. These and other health and human rights issues have driven Choi towards a path of advocacy, action and change. With Boston as a hub for powerful advocacy groups and organizations representing underserved populations,  Choi found time to learn and get involved. He is a member of the non-profit group, Physicians for Human Rights and Partners in Health, a Harvard-based group co-founded by Harvard physicians. To Choi, both were strong and compassionate advocates and mentors. “These physicians demonstrated that it's okay to push and demand when it involves health care for people who need it most,” Choi said. “To watch/witness this kind of boldness was permission for me to be able to push, too.” In that spirit, Choi has lobbied Congress for HIV/AIDS funding and spoken out publicly. In recognition of these activities, Choi's Harvard classmates awarded him the 2003 Harvard School of Public Health Student Recognition Award. On  campus, Choi has been involved starting as a parallel curriculum medical student in 1999. He became an active participant  with the American Medical Student Association (AMSA). Last year, Choi served as the national coordinator for AMSA's Health and Human Rights Subcommittee and is currently the National Chair of Community and Public Health. He has been a guest speaker on activism and health and human rights, speaking at numerous regional and national AMSA meetings and institutions. In September, he was a co-presenter with MUSC President Ray Greenberg, M.D., Ph.D., at the Presidential Scholars program on health disparities. Choi was named a 2002-03 presidential scholar and was involved in interdisciplinary activities and experiences focused on lead poisoning in children. He is currently a fellow with the program working on legislative and international health  issues.  “Ricky is an extraordinary indivi-dual,” said Valerie West, Ed.D., associate provost for educational program and interim dean for student life. “His creativity, compassion and intelligence combined with his terrific positive energy and vast knowledge is focused on improving the population's health.” So what’s next for the ambitious Choi? In spring 2004, he is scheduled to serve as a staffer in a Congressional Subcommittee lead by U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman, one of the country’s leaders in health care and environmental policy. Choi also will spend a  two-week medical journalism internship with CNN, recognizing the powerful impact that media could have on improving health behaviors on a massive scale. To Choi, each experience is a step closer to his goals for providing clinical care in urban underserved areas and international policymaking and health care.  “Despite all of the challenges in medical education, training, malpractice and the business side of health care,  medicine to me remains a noble profession in part because we’re dedicated to serving the fundamental needs of people, ideally blind to their economic condition or where they live,” Choi said. “I only hope that I can help open minds and encourage others to consider the bigger picture of health care.” Catalyst Online is published weekly, updated as needed and improved from time to time by the MUSC Office of Public Relations for the faculty, employees and students of the Medical University of South Carolina. Catalyst Online editor, Kim Draughn, can be reached at 792-4107 or by email, catalyst@musc.edu. Editorial copy can be submitted to Catalyst Online and to The Catalyst in print by fax, 792-6723, or by email to petersnd@musc.edu or catalyst@musc.edu. To place an ad in The Catalyst hardcopy, call Community Press at 849-1778.