Sahar Barfchin

UConn School of Medicine, Class of 2015

I was born in Sweden and raised in Connecticut. I graduated from University of Massachusetts, Amherst with a BS in Psychology and Neuroscience. I worked in clinical research at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City for two and a half years while volunteering with various underserved groups in the city, after which I entered medical school. I also spent a summer in rural India. There, I learned about the surrounding communities and their great needs in healthcare and economic stability, and helped plan a model for providing such communities with adequate healthcare.

I joined UST because I saw a gap in my medical education related to underserved populations. I hope to learn about the unique challenges faced by various resource-poor communities in and around Hartford, and to work with these communities and colleagues from different healthcare professions in order to furnish sustainable healthcare projects for underserved patients. UST offers an education in leadership skills specifically related to organizing multidisciplinary groups dedicated to addressing a full spectrum of healthcare needs for underserved patients, as well as an education on how to open up local and national dialogues around such healthcare issues. Ultimately, I hope UST will help me better serve underserved communities by training me how to use my education to improve the lives of traditionally-overlooked patients.