Beginning on January 5th, MEDEX Northwest will offer a course on “Homelessness in Seattle” to coincide with the arrival of Tent City 3 on the University of Washington. This 10-week course is open to all UW students in the Health Professions. It is designed as an interprofessional training opportunity, and includes the participation of six schools within the UW Health Sciences.
UW MEDEX Course 580 has 35 openings for credit students, and 15 openings for on-site auditing. In addition, all ten lectures will be live-streamed via the MEDEX YouTube page, allowing many more people to audit the course, including those on UW satellite sites or across the country.
Please visit the course website for more information and to register.
Earlier in 2016, UW President Ana Mari Cauce authorized the move-in of Tent City 3 on the UW campus. This organized group of approximately 100 homeless individuals will take occupancy of Lot W35 beginning this Saturday, December 17th. They will be onsite there on south campus for the first 3 months of 2017.
A requirement of all 35 for-credit students is that they make at least two faculty supervised site visits to Tent City 3 for the purpose of engaging with the camp residents in health care issues. The local group UW Street Medicine will also play a key role as facilitators between the students and residents.
This is the first time a physician assistant program has taken the lead in developing an academic course on homelessness for students in the health sciences. Lois Thetford, PA-C, is providing the leadership from MEDEX.