New York City students interested in medicine are gaining experience before they even graduate from high school, thanks to a unique program at Maimonides Health in Borough Park, Brooklyn. 

The high school and college students in the Health Scholars Program at Maimonides try their hands at suturing and undergo CPR training, but their main job is to comfort patients and learn. 

“Patients are often having the worst day of their lives. No one wants to be in the emergency room,” said Sohail Sookram, a physician assistant student at Wagner College. “So it’s really important when you walk into your room as a provider that you clearly introduce yourself and you set expectations and you’re a warm, comforting voice.”

“They get to watch what’s going on in the emergency department,” said Dr. Daniel Novak, assistant medical director of the emergency department. “They get to be involved and hold the patient’s hand.”

“The medical world needs compassion and humanity”

When Novak simulates cardiac arrest on a model patient, the lesson for the students is to bring comfort and professionalism to the bedside.

That’s a takeaway Afzal Akhtar, a student at CUNY School of Medicine, says became personal after caring for his father.

“He had a triple bypass surgery and there ends up being a complication … but the doctor involved didn’t have any compassion at all,” Akhtar said. “So it made me realize the medical world needs compassion and humanity.”

Akhtar and his brother, Ali, now a medical school applicant, both completed the program and returned as mentors.

“This program has taught me so much about patient-centered care, how to be able to be a compassionate medical doctor,” Ali Akhtar said.

Ambitious and curious students spend three months shadowing emergency room doctors, gaining real-world exposure in an effort to spark a passion for a career in medicine.

Students as young as high school are getting hands-on experience, from interacting directly with patients to trying their hand at a simulation ultrasound.

“They have that basic interest,” said Melodi Harfouche, a second-year resident at Maimonides. “I remember I was actually a volunteer when I was in college, and I wanted to go into medicine, and doing stuff like this really furthered that interest because I felt more involved.”

Bridging the gap in a health care workers shortage

The American Hospital Association predicts a shortage of about 100,000 critical health care workers by 2028, a gap felt most acutely in states like New York and New Jersey.

Novak said the Health Scholars program was created as a way to bridge that gap.

“We have some students that have come and thought all their life that this is what they wanted to do,” Novak said. “And three, four weeks into the program, [they realize] … ‘Thank you, but this is not something that I can do.’ And then we have other students that thought maybe they would go and be a physician, but then they got to see, ‘Oh, actually, I like what the nurses do more.'”

“I see how they work with the patient, especially in trauma cases,” said Yassir Azzam, an undergraduate psychology student. “Something that not many people get the privilege of seeing is that we’re allowed to be in the room.”

Leaders at Maimonides hope these early lessons in comfort and care coupled with years of future training will help form the foundation of tomorrow’s trauma centers.

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