What Working Across Countries Taught Me About Cultural Complexity in Global Health
Once I began working in global health, I gained a much deeper sense of how cultural complexity shows up in the work, even when you are not physically on the ground. Most of my involvement has been through coordinating research, conducting interviews virtually, and navigating the perspectives of people who live and work in completely different environments than my own.
While working on projects in various locations such as Uganda, India, and Haiti, it was clear how different the cultural dynamics were in each location. This might seem obvious or straightforward, but it actually demands intentional thought, and it is something people often forget to account for in the middle of project deadlines and deliverables.
In addition, a very important part of working in global health is understanding the local traditions. For example, traditional healers in Uganda spoke about care in a way that didn’t fit into traditional biomedical frameworks. Care was grounded in long-standing community relationships rather than clinical authority. Those conversations made me question how we define “providers”, and that healing means different things to different people.
Through conversations with our partners, it became clear that community-based support systems were not just helpful additions. They were the backbone of care long before any formal program stepped in. Realizing this changed the way I thought about what global health work actually is. Instead of assuming that new interventions or outside expertise drive change, I had to recognize that most solutions already exist within the community. Our job is to understand how they work and figure out how to support them without disrupting what is already effective.
A lot of this learning can happen even when you are not physically present. You can feel cultural differences through the tone of a meeting, the way someone describes a barrier, or the kinds of questions that matter most to them. You start to understand that these are not small observations. They require intentional thought because if you overlook them, you risk designing something that does not fit people’s lives. You just have to pay attention and take cultural signals seriously.
This is why having any form of global exposure is so important for public health professionals. Even if your work happens through digital collaboration instead of field deployment, you gain a wider lens. You learn to empathize more deeply and start designing programs that make sense for the people who will actually use them. Understanding culture is not just a skill in global health, but the very thing that makes the work real and meaningful.
