The tsunami that slammed Sri Lanka in December 2004 propelled Shruti Gupta into action. The Johns Hopkins medical student enlisted a group of fellow students to provide care to survivors at the disaster site, assumed a lead role in soliciting donations of medical supplies from local hospitals and took on the logistically daunting task of arranging for the materials to be flown to the Sri Lankan Red Cross.

Gupta’s relief work on behalf of the tsunami victims led her to reconsider the professional path she had mapped out, that of providing one-on-one medical care. She realized that the country’s debilitating poverty and Sri Lankans’ lack of access to health care were as damaging as the tsunami itself.

“I want to return to Sri Lanka,” Gupta says, “not just with more medications, but to help bring lasting change.”