As I have said before, I am the first in my family to be born in the United States of

America. Both of my parents and older relatives are from third-world countries and did not come
with much. My grandmother worked her way up from a regular worker to become a manager at
the local McDonald’s. My grandfathers automatically enlisted into the military. I have traveled
to their home countries numerous times and have seen how hard is it to get health care unless
you are in a well populated city. Some have to drive roughly an hour to get to the neaeriest
clinic. Even in The States, minorities do not receive the standard of health care as they should. I
want to help close the discrepancies between minorities and receiving the proper health care
standard. My primary health focus would be to spread knowledge about health care. Both to
people working and making decisions as well as the people searching and receiving health care.

In health classes we learn that no two peoples cases are going to be identical. However
we did learn that certain races and ethic backgrounds are more prone to certain diseases and or
conditions. However it is not easy to find if your ethnic background is predisposed to something.
For health professionals we need to learn to share are strategies with other countries. Even the
most tiniest tips and tricks can save a life. There was a time when I was probably thirteen years
old, I was with my grandmother for a doctors appointment. My grandmothers’ English is not the
best with both her speaking and understanding of it. I was translating for both of them and we
could tell the doctor was getting annoyed with the basic questions she was asking. The
appointment was for an outpatient procedure to drain an infected cyst on her back. Instead of
asking more of her question she just said she understood because she did not want to take up
more of his time. Well long story short she did not understand the post-op procedures and the
infection got worse. To the point where it was effecting her daily life, in constant pain from
anything even grazing the infecting area.

Working in hospitals and rehab facilities has given me an insight of how ever so slightly
patients are treated based off of their ethnicity. Minor instances I witnessed include, just
assuming that they only speak Spanish, not using the proper shampoos and conditioners as
requested for curly hair. On a larger scale, some clinics and/or hospitals may leave out the
statistics when race heightens the chances of a bad outcome. Lastly, the bias remarks of
stereotypical jokes even add up after a while. All of these examples can effect a patient’s health
care and experience. It is important for health care workers to be welcoming and trusting that
way patients know and feel safe to come back for help if I needed in the future.

So here I am today studying about the ways I can prevent and show the small injustices
of minorities to help improve quality of health care as a whole. This minor for me is to be able to
travel to cities or even countries with a high level of minorities and show both doctors and
possible patients in those areas how health care should be. Implanting more strategies and basic
procedures to improve the quality of care. My main focus would be the power of education and
making sure the knowledge is out there for people to receive it. My short term goal is to be able
to travel and see how I can improve third-world countries health care and implement the ways
we do certain things in America over there. My philosophy is that health care should be universal
and shared. Being perceptive that not everyone knows the simplistic of terms and or procedures.