Student profile: Prabhat Arora

Prabhat’s expertise in strong health systems delivers global excellence to Tasmania 

Prabhat Arora, a Masters student at UNSW, has always had a connection with Australia, and in particular, Tasmania.

Prabhat is studying a dual degree in Masters of Health Leadership & Management and Master of Public Health with the UNSW School of Population Health. Prabhat was born in Karnal, Haryana, India and as an avid sports fan growing up, with a particular love of cricket, Prabhat’s favourite cricketer was fast bowler, Allan Donald.

“Allan Donald was the first South African cricket player to take 300 Test wickets and I was always a big fan of his speed and flair,” says Prabhat.

Prabhat’s friends, however, affectionately nicknamed him after another famous, though less statuesque player: the Apple Isle’s favourite cricketing son, Australian opening batsman, David Boon.

“Because I was anatomically solid, my family and friends nicknamed me Boonwhen I was a boy so I had an affinity with Tasmania, you could say, way before I started my Masters at the School of Population Health in 2023 or moved to Hobart earlier this year,” laughs Prabhat.

Prabhat is a globally experienced biomedical engineer. Prior to gaining his permanent resident visa to Australia in 2022, he worked with the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) on the global NGO’s Oxygen Program, in Cambodia.  A $US20 million health undertaking, the project as launched in May 2021 to procure and supply medical oxygen equipment to nine countries with unreliable sources of medical oxygen.  It was while in Cambodia, Prabhat began his Master with the School of Population Health.

Prabhat says comparably to his lifelong love of cricket, his love of understanding and utilising the relationship between medicine and technology through biomedical engineering also stemmed from youth. 

“I was always playing doctors as a child and was fascinated with people who had the power to actually save someone or were able to make a meaningful difference to someone’s life,” says Prabhat.

“Growing up, news of major fatal accidents on the highway near my hometown was all too common. The lack of proper imaging technology led to delays in critical diagnosis and treatment. This instilled in me a deep fixation on the need for robust infrastructure for a strong health system.”

The amalgamation of medicine and engineering through biomedical engineering is, says Prabhat, “the spinal cord of a hospital’s and health care system’s backend support”.

““Being a biomedical engineer is about gaining knowledge and expertise to understand, procure, manage and maintain all the advanced technological and medical equipment the health system’s workforce needs today to save lives.

“It ensures you are no longer myopic because you understand what goes on inside the body, and where the clinicians are coming from with their requirements to deliver excellence in healthcare.” 

A graduate of Guru Jambheshwar University of Science and Technology in Haryana, where he gained a Bachelor of Technology in Biomedical Engineering, Prabhat also has a Masters of Medical Physics, majoring in Radiotherapy, from The University of Manchester in the United Kingdom. Earlier in his career on his first trip out of India, Prabhat spent time working with his mentor Keith Heberlein PhD at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia and later for a decade with State Health Departments and Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) in India. Until this day, Prabhat draws immense inspiration from his one-time supervisor and mentor Dr. Samit Sharma, who was recently appointed Secretary of PHED & Ground Water in the Government of Rajasthan. While working with the MOHFW, Prabhat co-authored several technology intensive health programs. These health blueprints included India’s Biomedical Equipment Management and Maintenance Program, the National Dialysis Program and the Free Diagnostics Service Initiative; programs which today continue to ensure free and subsidised healthcare to millions across the world’s most populous nation. 

Today while continuing to work on his UNSW Masters by distance, Prabhat is employed as a Senior Asset Analyst with the Tasmanian Department of Health. 

Moving to Hobart, he says, has been challenging though comforting in that the Tasmanian capital often reminds him of his hometown Karnal, in city size, if not population.  Prabhat is currently hoping his fiancee, Forum Mistry, a pharmacist with similarly a background in public health, will soon join him in Australia. The pair met while working for CHAI in Cambodia and are waiting to receive word on Forum’s partner visa application to Australia.

“We have everything crossed especially as she would like to do a doctorate in public health here,” says Prabhat.

As Prabhat keeps busy working and studying, he is also looking forward to fulfilling a boyhood dream when he watches India take on Australia at the MCG Boxing Day Test in December.

He is also enjoying learning more about the Australian, and more particularly the Tasmanian healthscape, and its biomedical engineering requirements. 

“Working in Tasmania’s health department while doing my Masters is giving me a real depth of understanding about how things work in Australia,” says Prabhat.

“There is a real understanding in this country that the more you can learn, the more valuable contribution you can make to Australia in the future as a health professional. I am grateful to Assistant Professor Anita Heywood at UNSW, whose tremendous support navigating through the selection process, and my relocation to Australia earlier this year was invaluable. I also consider myself extremely fortunate to have my current manager, Scott Ellis, Medical Equipment – Assets Manager, who has consistently been accommodating and supportive of my studies and work.”