“What excites me about this position is I get to work with rural populations throughout the mountain region and I get to learn about their specific health needs that are going to be varied and diverse throughout the region and I’m excited to work on community engagement on issues of health, which I am very passionate about.”

“I’m a medical anthropologist who has spent the last 20 years doing research, teaching and community engagement on health issues. I’ve primarily worked on health disparities, reproductive health, disability, emergency medicine and the issues I’m most interested in lately are issues of trust in healthcare. My background is having worked on community health programs in India and Nepal, health research in Guatemala, health research in Oregon and also California. My personal and professional goals for this position are to learn more about the specific health needs in rural mountain areas of Colorado and to help build collaborative, inclusive programs that are really reflective of what’s needed in the community.”

“I anticipate [the needs] being centered around issues of access and disparities. So, what are the reasons why people aren’t able to access healthcare? And, of course, this can entail a number of structural reasons, specifically I see issues of mental health, aging populations, addictions. There are plenty of specific health topics that I can see would be very relevant in the communities I’m working with, working with diverse communities, working with the Latino populations.

[Another] key issue that I think shapes a lot of rural healthcare is trust, and why people do or do not trust their healthcare providers or their systems, issues of insurance and other kind of structural reasons that might shape how people make their healthcare decisions.”

“Collaboration is pretty essential to solving difficult challenges. I think people have unique points of view and they need to feel heard, and so the whole process of bringing people together and collaborating and sort of hashing out ideas and strategies and vision is a way to create programs that are inclusive and transparent and really reflect the needs of the community.

When I was working in India and Nepal I was working with local non-profits, NGOs, health advocates, people in the medical realm … So, you’re getting input from multiple people in the community about what’s really happening on health issues and you strategize together and that’s how you create programs that are sustainable and inclusive and really represent the needs of the community.”

“There’s historically been so much attention to urban populations and urban areas … rural communities legitimately feel overlooked. Their needs are not being represented, their voices aren’t being heard and you know there are countless examples of this.

So, in order to change this, it’s incredibly important to have the voices of rural communities in the decision making, to have collaborative work that really brings together a lot of disparate voices and you know, this is how people will feel represented and included and they feel like they are empowered to create programs that will actually be meaningful.

I think this is really foundational to create trust within communities and across communities. … To cross the urban rural divide you need to build relationships and trust and that takes time and investment and a commitment.”