Lisa Namatame, a first-year Physician Assistant (PA) student, is the recent recipient of a scholarship from the National Health Service Corps (NHSC) Scholarship Program. The program, supported by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Resources and Services Administration, awards academic scholarships to students pursuing primary healthcare training who commit to a minimum of two years of full-time service in geographic areas or healthcare facilities in the U.S. with limited access to healthcare services.
Namatame is originally from the island of Maui in Hawai’i and received her bachelor’s degree in public health from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in Honolulu. During college and after she graduated, Namatame worked at several healthcare clinics on the island of Oʻahu in Hawaiʻi before deciding to attend the PA program at Feinberg.
Learn more about Namatame and her experience in the PA program below.
Why did you choose Feinberg?
Listen to Namatame below:
I chose Northwestern’s PA program because of their small class size and I loved the family feel to it. Speaking with the students in the program prior to my interview confirmed how supportive the faculty here are, and the learning curriculum that the program offered, especially PBL, is amazing. I also really loved the idea of seeing patients during our first year through ECMH. We have so many connections here with four hospitals nearby. Being able to choose from different clinical rotations and having the ability to choose four elective rotations was a big factor in my decision to coming to Northwestern.
What previous healthcare experience did you have before attending the PA program?
During college, I was a home health nurse aide, and during the pandemic I worked at an outpatient psych clinic for one year and then moved onto becoming a medical assistant in a primary care office, where we worked with patients of varying socioeconomic status, as well as native Hawaiians. For about three months during the pandemic, I was a temporary helper at Kōkua Kalihi Valley. It was a wonderful federally qualified health center, and I was able to witness Hawaiian plant medicine and values being incorporated with western medicine.
I worked with a lot of Asian Pacific Islanders and there were over 20 plus languages being spoken, so we had interpreters coming in and the patients had different cultural values, as well. We were able to grow and harvest produce to promote healthy eating along with growing medicinal plants to be used for patients who wanted to integrate plant medicine and western medicine. Being able to serve this community who really needed help was very rewarding.
What are your clinical or research interests?
For clinical interests, I really love working with kids, so I am hoping to go into pediatrics after graduating PA school, but I am open. With the scholarship, I would love to start in pediatrics or family medicine and be able to make those connections with my patients and see them grow throughout the years which is something I am really excited and passionate about.
I think the community health aspect is important as well. I want to carry Kōkua Kalihi Valley’s mission of being able to provide patients with holistic care — not just seeing the patient as just the disease, but looking at their lifestyle and what other factors may be contributing to their overall health.
What does being a NHSC scholar mean to you?
I received my bachelor’s degree being in public health so preventive medicine is really important to me. Things like patient education, advocacy, reducing chronic illnesses and catching them early are what I want to incorporate wherever I work in the future. My parents are immigrants from Japan, and we moved around a lot when I was younger to different countries, so I experienced the frustrations of language barriers and reduced accessibility to healthcare living in certain areas during my childhood.
As a scholarship recipient and because of my past experiences, I hope to become an empathetic provider who is open-minded and able to see where the patient is coming from to build a trusting relationship with them.
What advice would you give to prospective PA students, or anyone who’s interested in studying medicine?
First, make sure you are going into medicine for the right reasons. School can be tough. When I’m stressed in school or it feels like there is no light at the end of the tunnel, I tend to fall back on my “why” and motivate myself to keep going. All my past patient experiences are what’s keeping me going to achieve what I want to do in the future.
Also, make it a point to go shadow healthcare professions you’re interested in. I was interested in medicine, but I wasn’t quite sure like what field to go into. I’ve shadowed PTs, physicians, OTs and PAs. By talking to different healthcare professionals, I was able to really choose the PA profession based on my past experiences and my personality. Usually, colleges also have pre-health advising centers, so being to talk to an advisor and make a five- or ten-year plan is helpful because going into medicine is a big commitment.