ABSTRACT
Students and healthcare workers travelling to low-resourced settings are at particular susceptibility to unique health hazards. These result both from their potential exposures in healthcare work as well as from the geographic context itself. Risks vary depending on the destination as well as the role of the student or healthcare worker and the practice setting. There are multiple potential work-related factors that may increase the health risk. There may be increased prevalence of pathogens such as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), tuberculosis (TB), chronic hepatitis, with limited resources to deal with inadvertent exposure. There may also be outbreaks of uncommon infectious disease that can be spread in healthcare settings, such as viral hemorrhagic fevers (e.g. Ebola) or Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS). Healthcare workers are at higher risk for some vaccine-preventable diseases due to potential occupational exposure, including influenza, varicella, pertussis and hepatitis B.
