Who are we?
APAMSA is the Asian Pacific American Medical Student Association.
We are a national organization that aims to address those issues important to Asian-American medical students.
One part of our mission is to bring together Asians and others interested in the health issues that affect Asians so that we may have a strong, collective, public and political voice. We are interested in both directly promoting the health and well-being of the Asian community as well as in helping all health care workers who work with these communities understand how to care for the Asian patient in a culturally sensitive manner. Finally, APAMSA provides an important forum for APA medical students to meet, exchange information and experiences and develop personally and professionally.
APAMSA's foundation was laid in 1993 by Asian American students worried about the present and future of their community and their role in it. These students began to discuss issues that they felt were ignored by existing organizations and formed groups at their local schools to help understand the unique challenges they faced as Asian Americans in medicine. Largely composed of students from east coast schools, these chapters also began to meet with each other in what would lead to the now annual APAMSA National Conference.
APAMSA officially started in 1995 with the first National Conference and has grown in many directions. As you can see on this site, there are several projects APAMSA is involved with. These include the Hepatitis B education and immunization project, the Bone Marrow Donation project, and the AAPI health initiative letter writing campaign. As our membership and sponsorship increases, we hope to expand our involvement in related campaigns.
APAMSA also has strong stances on many issues. Being an organization based on health care, we have spoken out against smoking and tobacco use targeting the Asian community, for responsible alcohol use, for immunization and for health standards addressing needs of the medically underserved.
If you are a medical student or health professional interested in these issues, please get involved with the Ohio State University APAMSA chapter. If you prefer to maintain virtual contact, subscribe to AAMSnet, our listserv, or check out some of the links to other API health and political organizations.