FSUCares preparing for medical outreach trips on spring break

Once again this spring break, FSUCares is organizing medical outreach trips to Immokalee, the Texas-Mexico border and Panama. On Friday, Florida State University College of Medicine students will be packing medical supplies donated by the Tallahassee community for the trip. Eighteen first- and second-year students will make the trip, along with seven faculty members. Two alumni, now continuing their medical education as residents, will return to the Panama town they visited as medical students.

“The mission of FSUCares is to increase outreach, including education, to underserved communities,” said Elena Reyes, faculty adviser for FSUCares, which she called “the ‘home-grown’ student service organization developed to carry out the mission of the school.” While this project is an official outreach effort of FSUCares, it also is an elective for which students receive credit. The course, titled “Cross-Cultural Medicine,” helps students develop the knowledge and skills to work with the underserved Latino community in Florida. Reyes is the course director.

This is FSUCares’ ninth annual spring break trip. Participants will leave March 5 or 6, depending on their destination, and travel to one of three sites: Filipinas, Panama, site of the first spring break trip in 2002; the Texas-Mexico border; or Immokalee, where the college now has a health education site. The packing will take place a week before departure because the students have a big exam next week. There’s a lot to pack.

“We take over-the-counter medications as well as clinic supplies,” Reyes said. “This year we are also having a clothing drive for Immokalee. Given the cold weather, the migrant farmworkers are in dire need. We also give a large food donation to a home for abandoned elders in Mexico.”

Students will be available for interviews and photos while packing supplies for the medical outreach trips on:

FRIDAY, FEB. 26

4 - 6 P.M.

FSU COLLEGE OF MEDICINE

1115 W. CALL ST., TALLAHASSEE

For more about FSUCares, visit http://www.med.fsu.edu/students/FSUCares/default.asp.