INTRODUCTION
Thousands of students, residents, faculty, and other professionals travel around the world every year to work on global health issues—some for short-term assignments, conferences, or workshops and others for extended periods. Many of them travel through established organizations, programs, and universities that have existing resources dedicated to risk management or protocols for safety and security. This is often not the case, however, for learners and faculty from independent programs or higher-education organizations, or for those linked to post-graduate programs in the medical field—namely residency programs. Most residency programs are affiliated with universities or medical schools that have experience providing resources for global travelers or have well-established academic partners and sites internationally. Many other programs, however, are independent and loosely affiliated, or they are linked to smaller institutions, community-based hospitals, faith-based organizations, and hospital systems that lack institutional risk management experience, partnerships, and resources. Even among those programs and institutions who understand and value the need to properly prepare travelers for work in other countries, their plans for safety, security, and risk management may be lax or even absent.1,2 The critical need to safeguard the security of the global health trainees and practitioners, particularly those who do not have institutional backing, is falling through the cracks.
Many global health-related programs lack institutional risk management experience, partnerships, and resources to properly prepare travelers for work in other countries.
RISKS AND CHALLENGES
Students, residents, and …