Dispatches from the Field: The Stethoscope Diaspora

Alvin Mena Cantero might seem indistinguishable from the thousands of hard-working Cuban immigrants in Houston. The 30-year-old recently bought a house in the suburbs and has two jobs, one as a family nurse and the other as weekend supervisor at a mental health center. But Mena is no ordinary exile.

Just four years earlier, he was among the tens of thousands of Cuban health professionals deployed to Venezuela under a bilateral aid-for-oil agreement initiated in 2003. He graduated at the top of his class from Calixto García University Hospital in Havana and was selected to serve in...

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