Bio


Christopher Llerena is a hospitalist with professional interests in global health and advancing health equity for Latino communities. Outside of medicine, he enjoys cooking, playing tennis, and hiking.

Clinical Focus


  • Internal Medicine
  • Hospital Medicine

Academic Appointments


  • Clinical Assistant Professor, Medicine

Professional Education


  • Residency: Boston University Medical Center Internal Medicine Residency (2026) MA
  • Medical Education: University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine (2023) IL

All Publications


  • Developing a global medicine student pre- and post-travel curriculum. BMC medical education Mehta, N., Fernandes, C., Llerena, C., Weine, S., Bosland, M. C. 2023; 23 (1): 735

    Abstract

    BACKGROUND: The popularity of short-term global health experiences amongst US medical students has been increasing. However, it remains a challenge for medical schools to comprehensively prepare students to work in an international environment and to contribute in ethically responsible and meaningful ways. Students of the Global Medicine program (GMED) of the UIC College of Medicine Center for Global Health set out to develop a pre-and-post travel curriculum that addresses some of these challenges.METHODS: The students surveyed the literature of 66 published global health curricula and identified aspects of pre-and-post travel training that were found to be under-addressed. They then developed a curriculum in conjunction with GMED faculty that incorporated these identified aspects of pre-and-post travel training.RESULTS: Five aspects of pre-and-post travel training were identified as being under-addressed in the literature while traveling. These domains include: [1] examining power relations associated with neo-colonization between and within countries; [2] training for bi-directional learning; [3] examining motivations and goals for participating in global health; [4] addressing personal resiliency and psychosocial wellbeing related to students' travel, and; [5] reflecting on the challenging aspects of the fieldwork experience.CONCLUSIONS: The student-driven curriculum is being integrated into the GMED program through structured didactic sessions, one-on-one mentor meetings and small group discussions. Once students have traveled, the curriculum will be evaluated with the foreign partners they visited.

    View details for DOI 10.1186/s12909-023-04606-5

    View details for PubMedID 37803366