Life's most persistent and urgent question is, "What are you doing for others?"
- Martin Luther King Jr.
OVERVIEW |
OBJECTIVE |
During this summer (2015), I intend on
gaining a deeper understanding of the underlying conditions that influence
different health challenges and inequities in the Dominican Republic, such as infant
health, trauma and emergency care, mosquito-borne illnesses, water-related
infections, non-communicable diseases, and diagnostics. I will develop an
extensive list of need statements by interviewing physicians, clinicians,
patients, community members and health officials in mainly two communities
(Jarabacoa and Cabrera), as well as collecting observations.
I will also begin to generate design concepts and engage locals in co-designing a solution to a validated health inequity. It is essential I involve the community in the creation of this solution for it to be sustainable, effective and culturally appropriate. I will build a comprehensive list of requirements and specifications for the design with my teammates in Mechanical Engineering 450 to develop a prototype and iterate the design process, eventually merging into M-HEAL, and return to gain usability information and refine the solution during the summer of 2016. |
From this experience, I hope to become nearly fluent in communicating in
Spanish and deepen my understanding of Dominican culture, as well as develop
sound design ethnography skills and my ability to perform needs finding and
screening and concept generation. These skills will be invaluable to my future
path, as I hope to help design healthcare solutions for low-resource settings
and work for an international healthcare company where I can engage in (and
even expand) their global health and service opportunities, working from
clinical needs to marketable solutions that reach patients and improve their
quality of life.
Ultimately, the goal of this project is to provide student groups with validated need statements with which to pursue projects to alleviate those challenges. My team and I will pursue a need with an engineering design project, hoping to develop a sustainable solution to a health inequity that reaches our stakeholders. |