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Inhalers Within Reach: M1 Students’ Guide to Affordable Access

For Saint Louis University medical students, caring for the whole person is taught early and often throughout their medical school journey. Third-year students Hannah Wiseman (Med ’26) and Krishny Karunanandaa (Med ’26) experienced this firsthand as they helped address a community need: approved access to inhalers for asthma and allergy patients.

Krishny Karunanandaa (Med ’26), pictured left, and Hannah Wiseman (Med ’26), pictured right, evaluate inhaler options for their patients.
Krishny Karunanandaa (Med ’26), left, and Hannah Wiseman (Med ’26) evaluate inhaler options for their patients.

During their first year, Wiseman and Karunanandaa worked under Professor Emeritus Raymond Slavin, M.D., to provide patients with low-cost inhalers in his asthma and allergy clinic in the former Health Resource Center (HRC). The two would also follow up with patients, calling to ensure they had a primary care provider for their asthma. Although they often did, cost remained a common barrier to treating their condition.

“In our phone calls, a common issue that came up was, ‘Yes, I have a primary care provider, but I can’t get access to the lower priced inhalers that I used to,’” Karunanandaa said. “Dr. Katherine Mathews encouraged us to research access to lower-cost inhalers and other resources.”

After researching federally-qualified health care centers, resources for lower cost medications, and the complexities of medical insurance, the students created a step-by-step guide for their peers to help uninsured patients find low-cost inhalers and other medications.

“Initially, it was about inhalers, but additional research expanded the issue," Karunanandaa.

Now as they embark on their clinical years, Karunanandaa and Wiseman expressed that their experiences taught them invaluable lessons in patient care and effective communication, extending to not only their patient interactions but also their peers. Wiseman shared that these critical communication skills are extremely valuable and will translate well into their future careers.

“We have the most patient interaction now as medical students, and our background in knowing ways to help them obtain lower-cost medications or just being able to relate to them as patients is a huge deal,” Wiseman said.