How California’s Immigrants Are Bringing Innovation—and Heart—to Health Care

From Biotech to Behavioral Apps, Newcomers Are Reimagining How We Heal Our Bodies

Immigrants are already essential to health care in California. But they will become even more important in the future.

Today’s health system is a giant mess—timely care is hard to find, drugs and treatments are ruinously expensive, and lethal mistakes are all too common. But things would be even worse without the immigrants who serve as doctors, nurses, and aides, often in places and in roles for which our clinics and hospitals can find no one else. In America, one in six medical professionals, and nearly one-third of physicians, are foreign-born; …

Tackling Childhood Diabetes With Conversations and Lab Work | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Tackling Childhood Diabetes With Conversations and Lab Work

Rohit Kohli’s Global Childhood, and Indian Medical Training, Taught Him How to Communicate—and Do a Lot With a Little

How can we wean children off sugar?

Answering that question is the focus of my research and practice at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, where I’m chief of gastroenterology, hepatology, and nutrition. …

‘We Put the Ultrasound Machine in the Local Pharmacy’ | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

We Put the Ultrasound Machine in the Local Pharmacy

Physician Assistant Luz Garcia Is Bringing a Family Practice to Where Her Community Is

If you walk into the local pharmacy in downtown Gonzales and turn to the right, you’ll see an examination room with an ultrasound machine. It represents more than just a …

To Stop a Deadly Cancer, Turn Everyone Into a ‘Hero’ | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

To Stop a Deadly Cancer, Turn Everyone Into a ‘Hero’

How Reducing the Stigma Against Hepatitis B Saved the Lives of Asian Immigrants and the Native Born

How have immigrant communities addressed a rampant disease—and maybe beaten cancer?

Some answers to that question lie in the story of a San Francisco campaign against hepatitis B.

Americans of Asian …

‘I Help My Patients Hear Themselves, Which Starts the Healing Process’ | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

‘I Help My Patients Hear Themselves, Which Starts the Healing Process’

After an Ayurvedic Doctor Solved His Digestive Problems, Ashok Jethanandani Returned to India to Become a Practitioner Himself

How can we help Californians manage chronic conditions and live better lives?

As an immigrant and a doctor of ayurvedic medicine, this has become my calling, but I came …

Why Are There So Many Filipino Nurses in California? | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Why Are There So Many Filipino Nurses in California?

After Filling a Nursing Shortage in the 1960s, Immigrant Caregivers Have Changed the Practice and the Politics of Health Care

In California hospitals today, immigration has diversified not only the state’s patient population, but the demographics of its caregivers as well.

It is now commonplace to be cared for at the …