Making the World a Healthier, Happier Place
Provide care for the indigenous population in a remote Panama village. Serve migrant patients at the U.S.-Mexico border. Donate medical and school supplies in rural Laos.
Medical service trips like these are just some of the ways SMU students and faculty members broaden their global perspective, build their cultural competence, and reinforce their choice of a vocation.
Often, these international experiences build relationships across disciplines. In 2018, for example, more than a dozen nursing, physician assistant, and physical therapy students, as well as faculty and alumni, traveled to Batata, Panama. Together, they set up and ran a pop-up health clinic.
Global outreach is not just about providing our students with international opportunities. SMU also hosts health professions students from other nations at our campus labs and research centers, including an annual undergraduate exchange program between SMU and Seirei Christopher University in Hamamatsu, Japan.