A global approach to health

Dr Nathan Grills knows better than most just how privileged the Western world is when it comes to health care. The 26-year-old Monash University medical graduate and recipient of a prestigious Rhodes Scholarship has already worked in desperately poor hospitals and health centres in Africa, Nepal, Papua New Guinea and Fiji.

But those experiences are just the beginning as far as Dr Grills is concerned - he eventually plans to help less-developed countries improve their health care systems.

His scholarship to Oxford University to undertake a masters degree in global public health, which he will take up next year after completing an internship at a regional Australian hospital, is an important step towards achieving this goal.

Dr Grills credits Monash's strong international perspective with initially fostering and ultimately cementing his desire to work on a global scale.

"From an early stage in my course, I had a number of opportunities to undertake overseas medical work, which proved to be an extremely valuable experience," he says.

Dr Grills worked in PNG and Fiji through vice-chancellor's medical grants and spent six months serving with medical assistance programs in Nepal. "Those experiences really opened my mind - in medicine, you can easily become very narrow in your thinking, but Monash has encouraged me to have a broader perspective."

Working in the community health program in Nepal reinforced Dr Grills' belief that in a development context, clinical medicine alone is a bandaid treatment for greater social and political problems.

"To personally effect any significant change, I need to be skilled in economics, politics and social anthropology within an international context."

Dr Nathan Grills