Degree-earners’ next stop: Clinic in Guatemalan valley

Megan E. Dunning
Mary and Daniel Loughran Foundation Jefferson Scholar
Class of 2008

Brent V. Savoie
The Schenck Jefferson Graduate Fellow
Class of 2007

May 18, 2008 | Hanging in a corner of Megan Dunning’s room on the Lawn at the University of Virginia is a framed photograph of young Guatemalan children learning how to sneeze into their sleeves.

The snapshot depicts a health education class that Dunning taught last summer at a free clinic for children living in the rural Guatemalan highlands.

“For me, I’m interested in medicine,” said Dunning, 22-year-old Mary and Daniel Loughran Foundation Jefferson Scholar from Fairfax. “The clinic showed me what kind of impact on people’s lives that you can have as a physician.”

Dunning and a classmate, Elizabeth Murphy, a 22-year-old from Warrenton, both spent six weeks last summer at the Primeros Pasos clinic in the impoverished Palajunoj valley of Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. Upon returning to U.Va. in the fall, the two friends decided to establish a student club devoted to raising money for the nonprofit clinic.

Dunning and Murphy are among 6,401 U.Va. students — undergraduate and graduate — who will receive a degree today at the university’s 179th Final Exercises.

In their final year at U.Va., the two young women founded the Inter-American Health Alliance at U.Va., a campus chapter of a national nonprofit that collects contributions for the clinic. At a benefit dinner they organized last month at La Taza, the duo raised $6,000 for the cause. They also convinced the U.Va. Medical Center to donate a box full of medical supplies, such as latex gloves, syringes and alcohol swabs.

The proceeds from the La Taza fundraiser will finance the clinic for a full two months.
Following graduation, Dunning and Murphy — both of whom are fluent in Spanish — will head back to Guatemala to spend a year working at the clinic.

“Being involved there, it’s really exciting,” Murphy said. “They’re always trying to respond to what the community needs. There’s a lot of potential for growth. We both decided that we wanted to stay involved.”

Last summer, Dunning and Murphy worked as health educators at Primeros Pasos, which translates to “First Steps.” Each day, elementary school classes would visit the clinic. The children would receive check-ups from a physician and would then attend classes on health topics such as the importance of washing hands, brushing teeth and eating nutritious foods.

“The experience was more than I could have ever imagined,” Dunning said. “I really felt like we were making a difference.”

Many of the children who visited the clinic were malnourished and underweight. Many had parasites that cause low weight and stomach ailments.

Dunning will continue to be a health educator when she returns to the clinic in August.
Murphy, on the other hand, received a grant from Pfizer to build chimney stoves in residents’ homes. Many of the adults living in the region rely on open cooking fires within their homes. The smoke, she believes, is leading to a greater risk of respiratory problems. Attendees of an adult health education program at the clinic will be able to sign up for Murphy to drop by and install a healthier stove.

After another year in Guatemala, Dunning hopes to attend medical school. Murphy said she has not yet decided what she wants to do, though she has considered obtaining a medical or business degree.

Dr. David Burt, a U.Va. professor of emergency medicine, acted as an informal adviser to Dunning and Murphy. “They are two exceptional young women,” he said. “They’ll do very well in whatever they decide to do.”

Burt himself volunteered for a year in Guatemala after graduating from medical school in 2000. At U.Va., he is establishing a January-term course in which U.Va. students will visit the country and learn about its challenges.

Primeros Pasos was founded in 2002 by U.Va. alumnus and the Schenck Jefferson Graduate Fellow, Brent Savoie, and a group of Guatemalan medical students and another American med student. Each year, between 50 and 75 foreign student volunteers work at the clinic. U.Va. has been among the clinic’s most reliable sources of volunteers, Savoie said.

He said that Dunning and Murphy played a “tremendous role” in Primeros Pasos’ work in Guatemala. Their campus chapter of the Inter-American Health Alliance is serving as a model for other universities. And, he said, they greatly expanded the clinic’s base of donors pledged to give on ongoing basis.

“They exemplify the difference that volunteers have made at Primeros Pasos and why we believe in the power of service learning,” Savoie said.

With reporting by Brian McNeill, Daily Progress