Fourth-year medical student Emily Leven, center, with first-year medical student Emma Stanislawski and second-year medical student Eddie Cytryn.
Students from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai distributed more than 150 gifts—at a value of more than $4,000—to patients of the East Harlem Health Outreach Partnership (EHHOP) on Saturday, December 16. The student-run clinic provides free health care to uninsured patients in East Harlem. The students compiled an Amazon “wish list” of gift requests for patients or their family members that included winter clothing, kitchenware, children’s toys, and books. “We were so pleased by how many people generously contributed,” says Emily Leven, a fourth-year medical student who led the project. Ms. Leven credited the success to medical students and faculty, doormen at the student residence building who helped organize packages on arrival, administration staff who helped publicize the event, and those who donated. “Donors purchased every gift we asked for and wrote kind notes to our patients,” she says. “It highlighted that we are part of a community here.”