A native of Somerset, N.J., Shazia Mehmood serves as AMSA's Vice President of Leadership Development. Shazia has a notable history in AMSA national leadership, serving as the National Policy Chair and co-Legislative Director from 2010-2011 and the National Policy Coordinator for the Race, Ethnicity, and Culture in Health Committee for two years from 2009-2011. Shazia also interned at the AMSA national office during the summer of 2007, where she corresponded with campaign directors and health policy directors from the 2008 presidential campaigns and composed a healthcare platform guide for AMSA members. Locally, Shazia was founder and president of the Drexel Chapter of AMSA, and served as Health Policy Fellow for two years at the RWJMS Chapter.
As a History and Political Science major at Drexel University, Shazia participated in a roundtable discussion on health policy and urban regeneration with HRH Prince Charles, as one of fourteen graduate and undergraduate students selected in the region. In 2008, Shazia was the only graduating senior from Drexel awarded the Dean's Award for Outstanding Leadership & Academic Excellence.
During the summer of 2009, Shazia was selected as a Global Health Fellow, as part of Duke University's Governance program, and subsequently served as a research intern in the Patient Safety Programme of the World Health Organization at national headquarters. At the WHO, Shazia conducted primary qualitative research on the outcomes of three different WHO patient safety initiatives in 54 member states.
Shazia's research experience grew during her third-year of medical school when she conducted IRB-approved research and wrote literature reviews in a variety of women's health fields, including sex education policy in the US, abortion policies in South Asia, and contraceptive practices in South Asian American women.
As a rising fourth year medical student at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Shazia is also an active leader on her campus. She is the incoming Director for the Promise Clinic, a fully-student run clinic in New Brunswick, N.J., where she directly manages the quality improvement and public health committees. Shazia’s commitment to health equity and policy was recognized by the Association of American Medical Colleges, who awarded her with the Herbert W. Nickens scholarship, as one of five entering third-year students in the United States.
Shazia is very passionate about her work in policy and research, and hopes to pursue a career in primary care internal medicine.