Sukaina Shivji '26 spent her sophomore summer working with the Project Healthcare cohort at Bellevue Hospital, a public safety net hospital and Level 1 trauma center. 

A bit about me!

I’m a junior from NYC studying Molecular Biology, and minoring in Global Health and Health Policy. As you might expect, I am also on the pre-med track. My summer 2024 experience has molded the passion I have for medicine into tangible interests that I hope will shape my future career. 

What was your experience this summer?

This past summer, I was part of the Project Healthcare cohort at Bellevue Hospital, a public safety net hospital and Level 1 trauma center. I was initially attracted to this program because of its volunteer rotations around the Bellevue Emergency Department (ED). I wanted an internship that provided me with the opportunity to make an impact, but also allow me to grow and gain experience working with underserved patient populations. I emerged with this and more.

My primary responsibility was to act as a patient advocate in the ED, rotating around the various areas including Adult Emergency Services (AES), Pediatric Emergency Services (PES), Trauma/ICU (TICU), Urgent Care, and Triage. This looked like providing patients with food and water, keeping a patient company if they needed some extra support, accompanying patients to the restroom, rearranging beds to make extra space, etc. Any nonclinical need was likely handled by one of us (volunteers). We were also given the opportunity to shadow in other areas including the OR, the Cardiac Catheterization Lab, the Safety Net Clinic, and ED social work. Shifts were typically 5 hours almost every day including weekends and holidays. We also occasionally worked overnight. In addition to this, our cohort was broken into teams of students that conducted research on a specific issue related to health equity. My group focused on a diabetes screening initiative in EDs.

Out of everything I had the opportunity to do, the most memorable experiences were when I was speaking with patients. I was honored to be in a position where many patients felt they could lean on me for emotional support. Hearing stories about grief, loss, substance abuse, homelessness, immigration, and witnessing the way all of these experiences intersect with the medical system really emphasized to me the importance of empathy in medicine and the role of social determinants of health. The physicians at Bellevue do an absolutely amazing job at centering this, and I am so grateful to have been able to observe what they do.

How did you find your internship? How did you fund it?

I stumbled across this internship online when looking for programs close to home. HPA helped connect me with a Princeton student who had done it so I could learn more!

This internship was entirely unpaid, and as a low-income student I wasn’t too excited about that. I looked into funding options through the university and was able to apply to the SSII (Summer Social Impact Internship) Fund.

What advice would you give to students looking for opportunities?

My biggest advice is to find an opportunity that helps grow your perspective. Getting stuck inside the “Orange Bubble” of Princeton is very real, and I think that being able to do something that helps you understand experiences different from your own will broaden your point of view and allow you to do some introspection too. It doesn’t have to be the most reputable program, or the one that will “look good”. Do something that changes you, for the better.