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Students return from high altitude mission by Maggie Diebolt Public Relations Second-year medical students Blake Cleveland and Amanda Shepherd recently completed a high altitude, three-week medical mission trip to India with the Himalayan Health Exchange where they helped treat more than 1,500 patients in seven different communities.   Shepherd, a Portuguese native and graduate of the University of South Carolina, and Cleveland, an Anderson native and a graduate of Wofford College, heard about the program from students who participated in the trip last year.   Friends for several years and the only ones from their MUSC class who participated, they joined medical students from around the world and had the opportunity to work with doctors, nurses and dentists during their trip. They traveled along the border between India and Tibet, camped outdoors and worked in health centers set up in nearby schools, churches or tents.   While the transition from sea level to 18,000 feet was difficult, and acclimation took as long as the trip itself, the experience was meaningful.   “Not only did we get to experience all different types of medical care, we got to work with everyone on the trip. I’d highly recommend it to anybody—the experience was so worthwhile,” Cleveland said.   Shepherd noted traveling as her favorite aspect of the trip. “Getting to see the Himalayas, each village was different and each driving trip was different,” she said.   The Himalayan Health Exchange (HHE) started in 1996 with the mission to provide medical and dental care to underserved people living in remote areas of the Himalayas in India and Nepal. HHE offers MUSC students the opportunity to gain international health exposure, diverse cultural medical understanding and hands-on medical experiences in the spirit of learning.   “We worked mostly with Tibetan refugees. There are not a lot of medical expeditions there due to the location and the terrain,” Cleveland said. “The Hindu and Buddhist cultures are well-preserved, and the cultural experience and patient contact were invaluable.”   The local people, some of whom had never received medical care, would travel for miles to speak to the HHE doctors and medical students. The international medical team would assess the patients, determine the best possible care and, if needed, provide the patient with as much medicine as possible. Cleveland and Shepherd helped provide short-term health care solutions as well as preventative medicine and public health education to refugees living in the remote areas along the Indo-Tibetan borders.   “We learned an enormous amount about medicine, including cultural differences and its relation to medicine, patient needs assessments, health education, technical and pharmaceutical knowledge, and most importantly, how to be resourceful with limited supplies. It was astonishing to witness firsthand the lack of health care available to the financially disadvantaged community in India. They live a very hard life,” Cleveland said.     Friday, Sept. 22, 2006 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 catalyst@musc.edu. To place an ad in The Catalyst hardcopy, call Island Publications at 849-1778, ext. 201.