26
COM Outlook . Spring 2015
INTERNATIONAL OUTREACH
Inaugural Odyssey to
India Provides
Interprofessional
Health Care
By OMS-II Siddarth Goyal
uring the holiday
break last Decem-
ber, Anthony J.
Silvagni, D.O., Pharm.D.,
M.Sc., FACOFP
dist.
,
professor of family medi-
cine and public health and
dean emeritus, along with
OMS-II Siddarth Goyal
and Ashok Patel, D.M.D.,
organized an international
medical outreach trip to
Ahwa, India, that benefit-
ted the underprivileged
tribal population of Dang,
Gujarat, which is a severe-
ly underserved pocket of
an otherwise affluent state.
Although NSU-COM
has coordinated many
medical outreach trips to
underserved countries
over the past 15 years,
this was the college’s
inaugural trip to India—
and the first to include
significant participation
from NSU’s College of
Dental Medicine. Thanks
to the collaboration of the
joint NSU-COM and Col-
lege of Dental Medicine’s
Indian Physicians of South
Florida (IFOF) chapter,
10 medical and 3 dental
students participated in
the medical outreach trip.
They were Natasha Patel,
Nimish Maniar, Radha
Patel, Stephanie Tamayo,
Anu Nair, Aroba Sadaf,
Siddarth Goyal, Varun
Goyal, Nishant Patel,
Bansi Patel, Sunny Parekh,
Christy Vadakkan, and
Rohin Chand. Other
participants included Dr.
Silvagni, Dr. Patel, Dianna
Silvagni, J.D., clinical as-
sistant professor of medi-
cal education, Lalit Goyal,
M.D., and Shivani Goyal.
During the medical out-
reach endeavor, which took
place December 22-27, free
medical and dental services
were provided at the gen-
eral hospital. Thanks to the
assistance of the KJ Patel
Charitable Trust, which is
building a state-of-the-art
health care facility in the
area, vital local arrange-
ments were coordinated
prior to our arrival. We also
received an overwhelming
amount of support from the
local community as both lo-
cal authorities and govern-
ment officials welcomed
us warmly. In addition, we
were assisted by hospital-
appointed physicians,
which included an ophthal-
mologist, a dental surgeon,
and a gynecologist.
During our time in
India, the students had an
D
