Breeanna Lorenzen

Breeanna is a fourth-year medical student at the University of Minnesota Medical School. After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley, she became a Global Health Corps Fellow and worked to improve health services in the largest refugee settlement in Uganda. She witnessed daily how the lack of access to healthcare led to unnecessary morbidity. However, she was also inspired with how creative solutions could overcome barriers. Her subsequent work in Liberia over the following three years centered around one such solution: community health workers who could deliver care directly in their villages. Her time in Liberia was punctuated by the worst Ebola outbreak in history. As Deputy Country Director, she managed her organization’s response. This responsibility was challenging but keeping people safe and keeping the health system functioning was incredibly rewarding. The Ebola outbreak demonstrated to her the need for understanding tropical medicine and the global risk that emanates from poorly functioning health systems.

Her work in medical school continued to focus on health equity and global health in the local context. She joined a student-run free clinic as a Community Health Worker and then took a leadership role as Clinic Coordinator. She completed a social medicine course, led her school’s Global Health Impact Group and became an advocate with the Sexual Violence Center to create systemic change. Breeanna is excited to return to Liberia through the Kean Fellowship to work on a research project aimed at strengthening emergency medical care at the largest public hospital in the country.

What does the Kean Fellowship mean to you?
I vividly remember the day the first patient with suspected Ebola walked into the nearby hospital. The questions my staff asked during our daily updates that year still stick with me. Since starting medical school, it has been my goal to return to Liberia to participate in a meaningful project aimed at health system strengthening. The Kean Fellowship has made this dream possible. This fellowship will allow me to learn more about the Liberian health system; to work side by side and learn from inspirational local health workers; and to contribute to a project that can lead to improved health outcomes. The Kean Fellowship gives me the chance to pursue my career goal to be a global health physician dedicated to working locally and globally with others to improve healthcare for all.

What do you anticipate learning?
I aspire to learn all I can about the Liberian healthcare system and the strengths and challenges of delivering emergency care at a large public hospital with limited resources. I will learn about the WHO Basic Emergency Care project, triage systems and the potential of bi-directional mentorship and partnership. I approach this experience with cultural humility and hope to learn from local healthcare workers what their experience providing care is like. I look forward to developing my research skills in project and impact evaluation. I am also eager to learn more about the Liberian culture and to engage with the community.

What interests you about tropical medicine and what problems are you interested in solving?
Tropical medicine is important to me because I saw the unnecessary morbidity and mortality these diseases cause. People I knew in Uganda and Liberia were dying of malaria, diarrheal diseas, and pneumonia—all treatable diseases. The Ebola outbreak, however, made me realize a knowledge of tropical medicine is essential not just for improved health in tropical countries but for health globally. Improving tropical medicine to me includes health system strengthening. It is my goal to gain a clinical knowledge of tropical medicine and an understanding of health system improvement to advance global health as a future physician.