Cheryl Yang

Andrew W. Mellon Undergraduate Fellow in the Humanities

20062007 Forum on Travel

Cheryl Yang

Biology, Economics

College '08

Doctors’ Flight, Patients’ Plight: the Catch-22 of Health Care in Developing Countries

The basic health care needs of many people in developing countries remain unmet because of a shortage of skilled physicians and nurses. A major cause of this shortage is “brain drain,” the exodus of health care professionals to other countries in search of a better life. What are the migration experiences of foreign-trained health care workers in Philadelphia? What economic, social, and political reasons influenced their decision to emigrate? How did their medical career influence that decision?