Taking Care of the Puerto Rican Patient: Historical Perspectives, Health Status, and Health Care Access

Date of Review: January, 2021

This resource, from MedEdPortal, is a multimodal workshop which seeks to inform health care trainees and professionals about the social determinants of health of the Puerto Rican community, with an emphasis on medical conditions. The workshop is comprised of four components, a didactic session, three case discussions, a reflection exercise, and a discussion regarding recommendations of how to serve the Puerto Rican community. The didactic portion delivered via PowerPoint, focuses on increasing the learner’s knowledge about Puerto Rican history and identity formation, the health status of Puerto Ricans, barriers experienced when accessing health care, and the underlying causes of health care disparities experienced by Puerto Ricans. The case-based discussions allow the learners to apply their learnings from the didactic session to three cases of fictional patients through guided discussion. The reflection session allows the learners to discuss how their learnings from the didactic portion can be applied to the cases. The final component is a discussion regarding recommendations to serve the Puerto Rican community. Although this training was designed for medical students, residents, and physicians, it is also applicable to other health students and allied health professionals. –Ashti Doobay-Persaud, MD, NCEAS

Corresponding Author’s Email:

debora.silva@upr.edu

Institution:

University of Puerto Rico School of Medicine

Where was the Curriculum Implemented:

New York, United States

Source of the Curriculum/Resource:

MedEdPORTAL

Outcomes that Have Been Reported for the Curriculum:

Self-reported learner attitude

Self-reported learner knowledge

Outcome and Study Design:

Pre/post

Level of Learner Assessment:

Appreciation of content/attitude assessment (self-reflection, blogging with rubric)