ABSTRACT
Health training institutions in the "Global North" increasingly are seeking opportunities for their students to spend some of their training time experiencing healthcare in low resource settings. The students typically spend 4-6 weeks in Uganda experiencing first-hand health systems and disease conditions of the type and/or scale that they would probably not see back home. During their first week, the International Students Coordination Office provides elective students with an orientation to life in Makerere, Mulago National Referral and Teaching Hospital, Kampala and Uganda. While elective students are warmly welcomed and their presence among us is often extremely beneficial in providing different perspectives, hosting elective students represents a considerable investment of time and effort for the host supervisor, institution and community. Caution needs to be exercised to ensure that local culture and sensibilities are respected at all times, and ways should be found to reimburse costs borne by the hosts and ensure reciprocity.
