April 27, 2006
Health Sciences Open House: Focus on global health issues
A global health forum and free film screening will be highlights of the Health Sciences Open House, set for this Friday and Saturday. The free forum will be on Saturday at noon in Hogness Auditorium at the Health Sciences Center. Following the forum, the PBS six-part documentary series, Rx for Survival: A Global Health Challenge, will be screened throughout the afternoon.
The Health Sciences Open House is open to the UW community and the public from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Friday, April 28, and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Saturday, April 29.
At the forum, Dr. Stephen Bezruchka, Dr. Ann Marie Kimball, and Loyce Mbewa will discuss issues in global health awareness and action as an extension of the event’s theme, Passport to Health: Make the Global Connection! The panel members will focus on emerging and infectious diseases, and how projects and research happening here at the UW are having an impact across the world.
Bezruchka is affiliated with the International Health Track, (MPH program) and the Public Health Practice Program in the UW School of Public Health and Community Medicine. He has spent over 10 years in Nepal working in various health programs, teaching in remote regions
Kimball is professor of epidemiology and health services. at the UW and director of the APEC Asia Pacific Emerging Infections Network. She is an adjunct professor of medicine and an attending physician at Harborview Medical Center. In 2000 she was named a Fulbright New Century Scholar, and in 2004 she received a Guggenheim Foundation scholar award for her work.
Founder and president of the Rabuor Village Project, Loyce Mbewa has been leading the way for sustainable community development in her home village of Rabuor, Kenya. Her vision is to combat HIV/AIDS and the enormous resulting hardship through community-based solutions that build upon local innovation. A UW student, she plans to earn a master’s degree in public health and is a member of the Global Health Resource Center.
The PBS documentary series, Rx for Survival: A Global Health Challenge, will be screened in Hogness Auditorium immediately after the forum. Filmed in more than 20 nations around the world, and combining historical vignettes with contemporary documentary stories, the program tells the moving tales of extraordinary public health pioneers, past and present, and captures the real-life drama of today’s struggle to overcome poor health and rampant disease.
Because more than 1,500 high school students are expected to attend the Health Sciences Open House on Friday, families are encouraged to attend on Saturday. Many of these hands-on, interactive exhibits feature virtual reality medical presentations, high-tech patient simulators and computerized models of recent research. Information will also be available on educational and career opportunities in health sciences.
On Friday, parking is recommended in the UW E-1 lot only, and a special free shuttle bus will run through campus to the E-1 lot, located north of Husky Stadium off Montlake Boulevard just past the UW Intramural Athletics Building. The all-day parking fee is $4 upon entry. On Saturday, parking is available in the S-1 parking lot behind the Health Sciences Building. Parking in S-1 is $4 before noon and free after noon. For more information, call 206-685-9420 or see http://www.uwmedicine.org/global/newsandevents/hsoh.
