Supporting Medical Student’s Training: Rana Barghout’s Journey to Emergency Medicine

Center for Global Health is proud to highlight the achievements of Rana Barghout, a final year medical student at Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM).

Rana grew up in a small village in Egypt. At WCM, she developed a passion for improving emergency care for older adults. Last month, Rana matched into the top-ranked emergency medicine program at Johns Hopkins University. Congratulations, Rana!

As part of her final year of medical school, Rana completed a 6-week elective at the Weill Bugando School of Medicine in Mwanza, Tanzania. During her time at Weill Bugando, Rana spent 4 weeks rotating on the internal medicine wards and 2 weeks rotating in emergency medicine. She participated in daily rounds and educational meetings. She discussed clinical reasoning with Weill Bugando residents and attendings and followed patients throughout the course of their hospitalizations to learn about treatment outcomes. Rana’s rotation was supervised by Drs. Jennifer Downs and Rob Peck from the WCM Center for Global Health.

Reflecting on her time at Weill Bugando, Rana described how her elective in Tanzania had significant personal and professional impact. She learned to adapt her clinical reasoning to locally available resources and gained insight into how health systems shape medical decisions. She gained experience in diagnosing tropical diseases, such as malaria and schistosomiasis, and advanced disease presentations that are rarely seen in the United States. She also developed greater awareness of the structural determinants of health.

This is how Rana summarized her experience at Weill Bugando: “Studying there deepened my understanding of how health systems and resource availability shape patient care. It also reinforced my commitment to pursuing emergency medicine and to providing the best care possible, even when resources are scarce.”

We look forward to continuing to provide opportunities for exceptional WCM medical student like Rana to work with our international partners. In addition to fourth-year electives, the WCM Center for Global Health also supports summer electives after the first year of medical school, longitudinal research experiences (including Areas of Concentration in Global Health), and gap year opportunities.

Read more about Rana’s educational journey at WCM here.

To see more updates from the WCM Center for Global Health, follow us on Instagram: @wcmglobalhealth.

 Rana Barghout with staff at Weill Bugando School of Medicine