I am currently looking to do any sort of health-related volunteering somewhere outside of the states, but I can't seem to find a program that doesn't charge ludicrous amounts of money for "administration fees". Has anyone had experience with a reliable international volunteering organization? Also, I would like to volunteer sometime during the upcoming winter break (which for me falls between December 11th and January 4th).
International Volunteering
- Thread starter Toofison
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get in touch with your local church and see if they have any medical mission trips.
Thanks for the advice. I'm not really a fan of church missions, but I did take a look at some possibilities online. It seems that the church groups are just as financially demanding as the privately owned organizations (It apparently shows greater commitment if you pay for all expenses and make a significant contribution to the project out of your own pocket). Being broke sucks 
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do something local, then? traveling costs money. I'm sure it's hard to find a program that wants to pay a couple grand for you to count pills or take temperatures.
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Yea, I agree.
But, just for kicks, I travelled with a group called International Service Learning (ISL), and although they are a little bit pricey, I really valued my experience!
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True but at least you'll have something less common to talk about at interviews.
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It's probably more common than you'd expect.
I find it hard to believe that International Volunteering is looked at on the same level as local volunteering... It just seems like someone who takes the time (and saves the money) to travel to an underserved population and volunteers a portion of their life to these people is incredibly generous. Moreover, these people are not limited by HIPAA regulations and are actually able to converse with patients and help on a more basic level (be it education, purifying water, or helping the nurses/physicians). I know we need help in America, but a volunteer cannot do much to aleviate many of the problems. What we need in America are doctors volunteering their time in underserved populations.
I have a great amount of respect for those individuals who were able to travel to less developed countries to donate whatever skills they have to those far less fortunate than those in the states. It shows great character and also demonstrates a far more humanitarian view of the world. I am tired of all those people saying "volunteer in America to help out our people! There are sick kids here too!"... The problem is, volunteers (I am referring to pre-medical undergraduates) are not allowed to actually assist these people in a significant way. However, in developing countries, the simple act of purifying a villages water source can have a dramatic impact on many lives.
For those of you who say international volunteering is not inherently more valuable (or even looked upon as more valuable), do you have international experience? I find it hard to believe, because if you did you would understand the impact and significance of such an experience.
I have a great amount of respect for those individuals who were able to travel to less developed countries to donate whatever skills they have to those far less fortunate than those in the states. It shows great character and also demonstrates a far more humanitarian view of the world. I am tired of all those people saying "volunteer in America to help out our people! There are sick kids here too!"... The problem is, volunteers (I am referring to pre-medical undergraduates) are not allowed to actually assist these people in a significant way. However, in developing countries, the simple act of purifying a villages water source can have a dramatic impact on many lives.
For those of you who say international volunteering is not inherently more valuable (or even looked upon as more valuable), do you have international experience? I find it hard to believe, because if you did you would understand the impact and significance of such an experience.
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Yea, my comments above are taken to a pessimistic extreme. The point is there are international volunteers who travel and make a real, sustainable difference generally through long-term efforts, planning, and personal sacrifice. There is also a sickening amount of medical tourism in the world where people with too much money take a week long vacation and pretend their complete lack of any useful medical skills is a welcome blessing compared to the complete lack of medical skills of the indigenous population. I mean sure, we could train and equip the population but why bother when we can dump hundreds or thousands into flying some college student into the country to save the poor savages and do it for them.
The (largely buried in a rant) point is that there is a range of value in international volunteering and it's asinine to pretend everyone (especially people with no real skills or training) is doing some huge service by running around in another country for a week or two...
A vacation out of it? Your right, you do have a pessimistic view on the concept of international volunteering... My experience, albeit quite limited, was far from a vacation. I spent some time in Indonesia (not Bali, but a village near Jakarta) where the idea of vacation never spawned in my mind. I guess if I was volunteering in Cancun, or some notorious vacation spot a red flag might be raised...
When I volunteered, at my local hospital, I was specifically instructed to refrain from speaking with patients due to the possibility that I might be too immature to keep the material to myself. In fact, many of the nurses (no physicians were present) were annoyed with the volunteer presence. Why? Because we truly cannot do anything useful. CNAs are present for most of the patient care, and medical assistants take care of the rest.
Playing doctor... I did not mean to imply that purifying water or distributing medicine is playing doctor. I am aware that many pre-meds want to go to underdeveloped countries in an attempt to act outside the scope of their skills. Many of these individuals end up having a horrible accident (a needle stick in Senegal which resulted in HIV, comes to mind). However, there an array of options for an undergraduate to pursue in underdeveloped countries (none of which require pretending to be a physician...)
Who said a week long? I thought this board was about real volunteer experience. Not the fluff you are talking about. I was talking about a significant amount of time (i.e., at least a month, more if possible). Also, it is not unsustinable waste of resources. I am not even sure what to say to that seemingly arrogant disregard for human life.
With regard to the hundreds of thousands spent on sending college kids... I will be paying for the entire stay of my trip. No one is paying for me, I am paying for myself in an attempt (no matter how feeble) to help another culture.
as an international student. i dont see how international volunteering is more valuable...
i have lived in 3 to 4 different countries. and volunteered in 3 of them.. so well... not even on my amcas. i find it way too overrated.
just because u fly somewhere nad spend some money doesnt mean u did so much more for people.
just my opinion.
money does not equal effort
helping americans is similar to helping Africans. is similar to helping asians.
i have lived in 3 to 4 different countries. and volunteered in 3 of them.. so well... not even on my amcas. i find it way too overrated.
just because u fly somewhere nad spend some money doesnt mean u did so much more for people.
just my opinion.
money does not equal effort
helping americans is similar to helping Africans. is similar to helping asians.
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Yeah. International volunteering consumes lot of money.
But, it might provides very interesting stories to discuss during a medical school interview.
But, it might provides very interesting stories to discuss during a medical school interview.
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I don't think of it as rare or anything but certainly not as common as people who EMT or do regular hospital volunteering and what not. But yeah, it is more common than some people would suspect.
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I'm actually going to argue with this a little bit.
In America, there is a system in place to help the poor. People can dispute the effectivness of our wellfare system and medicaid and things like that, but the system is there. In many other places in the world, there is no system. My only point is that it's like comparing me helping out some guy in beverly hills vs at the corner of 24th and main street.
I'm not at all saying that it makes your volunteering any more meaningful to help Americans or Africans or Asians. I'm saying that the nature of what you will do and how badly help is needed is very disparate and to ignore this is to belittle the hardship many international nations face.
Going abroad to volunteer for a few weeks probably isn't that worth it. It reeks of resume packing, and a lot of interviewers might get a bad impression of a classic pre-med who thinks they are saving the world by running abroad for a few weeks to take blood pressure and mingle with patients whose language they can hardly understand. Skip this, and volunteer at a local clinic.
HOWEVER, if you actually have a bit of time to devote- I'd say at least 2-3 months over the summer, and preferably a sizable portion of a year or more, then the international work and larger scale projects start to look a lot more attractive. You can actually have the time to develop something of permanence, you can begin to integrate with the local culture...and much more importantly you can get the cultural and personal experience that will make you a more well rounded doctor. Plus it will make a more interesting story during interview discussions.
For any activity to be really meaningful, I think you should be able to have something really positive to say about what YOU accomplished and what you learned. A lot of people, me included, would be pretty cynical about the quicky premed trips. On the other hand, Peace Corps volunteers, Fulbright scholars, people who have taken a few years off, MPH graduates with a few years of experience in the field, and other variations have all done extremely well after their international experience- and make up a sizeable percentage of my med school class.
BTW: You should never have to pay to volunteer. It's normal to pay for your own living expenses, but not several thousand dollars in extra fees. I have worked for an NGO that gladly accepted students who paid about $5,000 for a summer internship. We gave them some good experience, but the main reason that they were accepted was for the money it brought to the organization. From an institutional perspective, I think this makes a bit of sense, especially if you are trying to go to a place where you have few advanced skills to offer. We had a choice of hiring local people to enter data and do simple tasks, or we could make $5,000 to fund other parts of the program and have someone do the same simple things. Keep in mind that if you don't have a lot of advanced training then the people you work with will have to train you, and that time and effort can require a bit of input on your part in terms of money- or at the very least a longer time commitment so that the group could see a better return on their investment.
HOWEVER, if you actually have a bit of time to devote- I'd say at least 2-3 months over the summer, and preferably a sizable portion of a year or more, then the international work and larger scale projects start to look a lot more attractive. You can actually have the time to develop something of permanence, you can begin to integrate with the local culture...and much more importantly you can get the cultural and personal experience that will make you a more well rounded doctor. Plus it will make a more interesting story during interview discussions.
For any activity to be really meaningful, I think you should be able to have something really positive to say about what YOU accomplished and what you learned. A lot of people, me included, would be pretty cynical about the quicky premed trips. On the other hand, Peace Corps volunteers, Fulbright scholars, people who have taken a few years off, MPH graduates with a few years of experience in the field, and other variations have all done extremely well after their international experience- and make up a sizeable percentage of my med school class.
BTW: You should never have to pay to volunteer. It's normal to pay for your own living expenses, but not several thousand dollars in extra fees. I have worked for an NGO that gladly accepted students who paid about $5,000 for a summer internship. We gave them some good experience, but the main reason that they were accepted was for the money it brought to the organization. From an institutional perspective, I think this makes a bit of sense, especially if you are trying to go to a place where you have few advanced skills to offer. We had a choice of hiring local people to enter data and do simple tasks, or we could make $5,000 to fund other parts of the program and have someone do the same simple things. Keep in mind that if you don't have a lot of advanced training then the people you work with will have to train you, and that time and effort can require a bit of input on your part in terms of money- or at the very least a longer time commitment so that the group could see a better return on their investment.
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The bottom line is that most pre-meds don't want to admit that their international volunteering is a self-serving investment with ancillary benefits to the people they serve. If the concern was helping a culture, the resources dumped into that volunteer experience would have been far more efficiently spent than sending someone with no skills to a country for a few weeks.
A US college student's largest contribution for any sort of project of the length and effort of most medical mission and volunteer trips is purely financial. And yet so much of that contribution is wasted in simply shipping the student to the country. Or do you really believe that a local couldn't have simply been paid to do what you did for a fraction of the cost? You honestly believe that the people of foreign countries are so ignorant and incompetent that they need to import a college student from America to accomplish tasks requiring no specialized skill or training?
There's nothing wrong with investing in your own skills, knowledge, experiences, etc but it's sad how few will admit it or even give enough of a damn about what their doing to realize it...
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This seems like its getting a bit out of hand...
Yes, it is technically more beneficial to send someone who has the skills (language, training, cultural understanding) to better a community, but when you sign up for an international program you're also paying for the experience. Experiences shape your personality, morals, and ideas. It's definitely impacted mine.
Understanding the trials and tribulations that others go through in other countries whose standard of living is not the same as the U.S. is just one of the things I've seen firsthand. The poor here are on a completely different level of destitution in third world countries that's its almost unreal. We're (I'll assume that most of us haven't lived in third world countries for +years) so used to living in our respective towns/cities and assuming we know what people are going through around the world when most of us don't have a clue.
Overall, does it really matter? The fact that you did volunteer here or overseas should be enough. You can only control whether your experience was more about giving than a vacation whether it's here or abroad.
Yes, it is technically more beneficial to send someone who has the skills (language, training, cultural understanding) to better a community, but when you sign up for an international program you're also paying for the experience. Experiences shape your personality, morals, and ideas. It's definitely impacted mine.
Understanding the trials and tribulations that others go through in other countries whose standard of living is not the same as the U.S. is just one of the things I've seen firsthand. The poor here are on a completely different level of destitution in third world countries that's its almost unreal. We're (I'll assume that most of us haven't lived in third world countries for +years) so used to living in our respective towns/cities and assuming we know what people are going through around the world when most of us don't have a clue.
Overall, does it really matter? The fact that you did volunteer here or overseas should be enough. You can only control whether your experience was more about giving than a vacation whether it's here or abroad.
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Agreed. My point is simply that it's tiring to see people try to cover the self-serving components of international volunteering by claiming it is somehow intrinsicly more altruistic than volunteering abroad or (even worse) that you have to go abroad to make a real impact in people's lives. I'm simply taking it to an extreme for the sake of argument...
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OP I was looking into some of these and some even wanted money to apply to volunteer? WTF! Sounds kind of like a scam to me... Plus then I was gonna do one through international medical relief. they warned that we would be sleeping outside and there probably wouldn't even be running water. It was super expensive. I figured it was just the flight tickets. I looked up how much the flight cost and found out that they charge $1000 more than the flight. To sleep outside, and have no running water??? I don;t think they were gonna feed us well, probably cook over a camp fire or something, that certainly wouldn't make my time there cost more than $300 over a 2 week long time period. So I asked why it cost so much. They never emailed me back. EVER. I really think a lot of these are just money making schemes.
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I think the benefit of volunteering abroad is not necessarily that you will make a huge difference in the lives of the people you are working with, but that your world view changes.
I think having some international experience opens up your thinking as to what else is out there, which may affect our future career plans. In all honesty as a pre-med you are most likely not going to change the world, but the activities we do now will affect what we do with the rest of our lives simply because we are still forming our thinking of health care systems, both in the US and elsewhere.
I think having some international experience opens up your thinking as to what else is out there, which may affect our future career plans. In all honesty as a pre-med you are most likely not going to change the world, but the activities we do now will affect what we do with the rest of our lives simply because we are still forming our thinking of health care systems, both in the US and elsewhere.
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I had a life-changing experience volunteering recently in Nicaragua for 2 months through an organization called BaseCamp. The fee is substantial at about US$2500, but considering that 8-week boarding, amazing food 3-times a day by a local lady, small-group (or in my case, one-on-one) Spanish instruction, and on-site coordinator service are all included, it's an amazing deal. The airfare to Nica was only about $320 for me round-trip, too. I had a chance to work in a level-1 trauma center (by their standards, etc), go on "brigada" where you give vaccinations and health exams to people in the countrysides, and also get a valuable cultural education by immersion as well by befriending the locals. I highly highly recommend it because you get medical volunteering/shadowing experience, language-learning experience, and eye-opening cultural experience all in one. Send me a Private Message if you want to know more about my experiences.
BTW: BaseCamp did NOT pay me to say all this. I just had an awesome experience.
BTW: BaseCamp did NOT pay me to say all this. I just had an awesome experience.
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I had a life-changing experience volunteering recently in Nicaragua for 2 months through an organization called BaseCamp. The fee is substantial at about US$2500, but considering that 8-week boarding, amazing food 3-times a day by a local lady, small-group (or in my case, one-on-one) Spanish instruction, and on-site coordinator service are all included, it's an amazing deal. The airfare to Nica was only about $320 for me round-trip, too. I had a chance to work in a level-1 trauma center (by their standards, etc), go on "brigada" where you give vaccinations and health exams to people in the countrysides, and also get a valuable cultural education by immersion as well by befriending the locals. I highly highly recommend it because you get medical volunteering/shadowing experience, language-learning experience, and eye-opening cultural experience all in one. Send me a Private Message if you want to know more about my experiences.
BTW: BaseCamp did NOT pay me to say all this. I just had an awesome experience.
It sounds like you had a quality experience.
Hi OP.
There are a lot of different programs that you can look into. It all depends on what exactly you are looking for.
I'm from a CA school most of the UCs (University of California) [though I suspect most US campuses have chapters set up] have chapters set up of international organizations such as Global Medical Training (GMT), Foundation for the International Medical Relief for Children (FIMRC), Global Medical Brigrade (GMB) and Flying Sams. These programs are good if 1.) You don't want to be too far removed from amenities like running water (though it was often not heated nor good pressure), a toilet, a bed and food provided, 2.) You also want to experience the local culture (I guess previous posters said its like a little vacation also) 3.) You want to work with local doctors rather than doctors from the US 4.) You want to be around people your age and make friends (and have fun too, aka a little vacation). Look at your local school or look into other schools contact them and let them know you want to join if this seems like an option for you.
If you want a different experience you can look into private religious organizations that go abroad. Such as Tzu Chi Fondation (Buddhist) or a Christian organization. Though I am not fond or religious missions, look into it many times they do not put religion into what they are doing. And actually a lot of times, for Christian organizations anyways, they work through local churches to set up the health clinic and going to mass/sermons are optional. Note when you go with these organizations you will be going with US doctors but who are all friendly and they do want you to help & give you a great experience (my friend was able to stitch up a patient after a surgery!). But you will not be with people your age...
The organizations I mentioned above at schools typically don't do surgery they do health clinics but I still found it well worth it as you will rarely see these ailments in the US (ie parasitic infections and work related problems). A good thing about FIMRC is that they work to establish long-term clinics there so you won't only be seeing patients you are helping to build a clinic and there are also non-medical duties. Another great thing about FIMRC that I like is that they take days to actually teach health practices to the local children and the expecting mothers so that they can avoid re-occurances of medical problems.
I recently went with GMT for a week to Nicaragua it was an amazing experience but I did have to pay 1000$ + airfare. So for a week I paid ~1600$ and was wary of the fee but I think it was well worth it, I do speak basic Spanish but I can understand well so I was able to converse with patients; the experience helped me greatly improve my medical Spanish (which has helped me back at my medical office job in the US). The doctors there basically let you be in charge. You are with the patient and a translator; you get to tell your diagnosis and the treatment needed, the doctor will then come in and tell you if you are right or wrong. Its a great learning experience to build your patient-doctor skills, which I feel US volunteering lacks. You also learn to recognize things that you normally wouldn't realize.
About the fees you need to understand that the fees for volunteering do not only go to room and board. In the countries that you are going to the translators and some of the doctors they don't have the opportunity to take off a lot of time, every day working is necessary for them; so many times the company is paying for translators, doctors to head the programs, organizers to contact cities of interest and set up camps and drivers to transport you here and there (GMT, FIMRC are a year-round missions, for the local people who work the missions this is typically their only job). In addition to paying for this you are also paying for medical supplies. It would be pointless to go to a rural area and say to them "Your child has iron deficiency you need to go the local clinic _____ miles away and buy XXXX amount of iron pills for XXXX dollars." Instead what happens is you tell them what they have and give them medicine for it. You will be seeing up to a hundred patients a day and thats a lot of medicine (multiply that by how many clinics per week). GMT gave at least a month supply of medicine to each patient. But I def. suggest looking into where your money is going to. E-mail or call them and ask where the money goes too, and if you get no reply like a previous poster its better to avoid!
I hope this helps you out! It all depends on what you are looking for and what you have money for. Good luck, i've done a lot of international relief and its totally different from the US but its always what you make out of it!
Oh and also some of that money went to non-medical activities. We went zip-lining and took tours of the cities and went to museums and spent the day at a lagoon. Some of these "missions" do allow a little fun, you get a little fun vacation out of it; if you can afford it anyways..
There are a lot of different programs that you can look into. It all depends on what exactly you are looking for.
I'm from a CA school most of the UCs (University of California) [though I suspect most US campuses have chapters set up] have chapters set up of international organizations such as Global Medical Training (GMT), Foundation for the International Medical Relief for Children (FIMRC), Global Medical Brigrade (GMB) and Flying Sams. These programs are good if 1.) You don't want to be too far removed from amenities like running water (though it was often not heated nor good pressure), a toilet, a bed and food provided, 2.) You also want to experience the local culture (I guess previous posters said its like a little vacation also) 3.) You want to work with local doctors rather than doctors from the US 4.) You want to be around people your age and make friends (and have fun too, aka a little vacation). Look at your local school or look into other schools contact them and let them know you want to join if this seems like an option for you.
If you want a different experience you can look into private religious organizations that go abroad. Such as Tzu Chi Fondation (Buddhist) or a Christian organization. Though I am not fond or religious missions, look into it many times they do not put religion into what they are doing. And actually a lot of times, for Christian organizations anyways, they work through local churches to set up the health clinic and going to mass/sermons are optional. Note when you go with these organizations you will be going with US doctors but who are all friendly and they do want you to help & give you a great experience (my friend was able to stitch up a patient after a surgery!). But you will not be with people your age...
The organizations I mentioned above at schools typically don't do surgery they do health clinics but I still found it well worth it as you will rarely see these ailments in the US (ie parasitic infections and work related problems). A good thing about FIMRC is that they work to establish long-term clinics there so you won't only be seeing patients you are helping to build a clinic and there are also non-medical duties. Another great thing about FIMRC that I like is that they take days to actually teach health practices to the local children and the expecting mothers so that they can avoid re-occurances of medical problems.
I recently went with GMT for a week to Nicaragua it was an amazing experience but I did have to pay 1000$ + airfare. So for a week I paid ~1600$ and was wary of the fee but I think it was well worth it, I do speak basic Spanish but I can understand well so I was able to converse with patients; the experience helped me greatly improve my medical Spanish (which has helped me back at my medical office job in the US). The doctors there basically let you be in charge. You are with the patient and a translator; you get to tell your diagnosis and the treatment needed, the doctor will then come in and tell you if you are right or wrong. Its a great learning experience to build your patient-doctor skills, which I feel US volunteering lacks. You also learn to recognize things that you normally wouldn't realize.
About the fees you need to understand that the fees for volunteering do not only go to room and board. In the countries that you are going to the translators and some of the doctors they don't have the opportunity to take off a lot of time, every day working is necessary for them; so many times the company is paying for translators, doctors to head the programs, organizers to contact cities of interest and set up camps and drivers to transport you here and there (GMT, FIMRC are a year-round missions, for the local people who work the missions this is typically their only job). In addition to paying for this you are also paying for medical supplies. It would be pointless to go to a rural area and say to them "Your child has iron deficiency you need to go the local clinic _____ miles away and buy XXXX amount of iron pills for XXXX dollars." Instead what happens is you tell them what they have and give them medicine for it. You will be seeing up to a hundred patients a day and thats a lot of medicine (multiply that by how many clinics per week). GMT gave at least a month supply of medicine to each patient. But I def. suggest looking into where your money is going to. E-mail or call them and ask where the money goes too, and if you get no reply like a previous poster its better to avoid!
I hope this helps you out! It all depends on what you are looking for and what you have money for. Good luck, i've done a lot of international relief and its totally different from the US but its always what you make out of it!
Oh and also some of that money went to non-medical activities. We went zip-lining and took tours of the cities and went to museums and spent the day at a lagoon. Some of these "missions" do allow a little fun, you get a little fun vacation out of it; if you can afford it anyways..
