Parangkush Subedi

Early Life and Refugee Experience

Parangkush "PK" Subedi was born in rural Bhutan to a Lhotshampa farming family. He was eleven years old when he and his parents left Bhutan during the refugee crisis of the early 1990s. He spent nearly 15 years in refugee camps in Nepal before family members were resettled across the United States, Canada, and Europe.

Prior to resettlement, Subedi earned a Master of Science from the Asian Institute of Technology in Thailand, specializing in microbiology.

Resettlement and Career Change

In 2008, Subedi was resettled in Clarkston, Georgia by the International Rescue Committee (IRC). He observed that healthcare access and navigation were among the most critical challenges facing newly arrived refugees, which led him to pivot his career from microbiology to public health.

Mental Health First Aid Initiative

While working at the Philadelphia Department of Public Health, Subedi identified a critical gap: the alarming suicide rate among resettled Bhutanese refugees was being addressed through Western clinical models that were culturally unfamiliar to the community.^[4]

In July 2014, he coordinated with the Pennsylvania State Refugee Program and the Office of Refugee Resettlement to organize Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) trainings for over 120 Bhutanese community leaders from 11 states. This groundbreaking program trained community members — not clinicians — to recognize signs of mental health^[2] crises and provide initial support in culturally appropriate ways.

Published research on the program showed that participants demonstrated significant improvement in recognizing symptoms of depression and developed beliefs about treatment more aligned with mental health professionals — a critical shift in a community where mental illness often carried deep stigma.

Office of Refugee Resettlement

Subedi now works at the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) as a Health Program Analyst, overseeing the emotional wellness program within the Division of Refugee Health. In this role, he helps shape national policy on refugee mental health.

Publications

Subedi has published peer-reviewed research on refugee mental health and tuberculosis, and has spoken at numerous refugee conferences as a panelist. His published works include studies on the effectiveness of culturally-appropriate Mental Health First Aid training for Bhutanese refugees.

Significance

PK Subedi's work has directly addressed one of the most painful challenges facing the Bhutanese diaspora: the crisis of suicides among resettled refugees. By training community leaders rather than relying solely on clinical professionals, he created a culturally-grounded model of mental health support that has been replicated and studied nationally.

References

1. "The Faces of New Americans: Meet Parangkush Subedi." Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, November 2015.
2. Subedi, Parangkush et al. "Mental health first aid training for the Bhutanese refugee community in the United States." International Journal of Mental Health Systems, 2015.
3. Subedi, Parangkush et al. "Culturally-Appropriate Orientation Increases the Effectiveness of MHFA Training for Bhutanese Refugees." PubMed, 2020.
4. "Placemaking by and for Bhutanese Refugees in the Midwest." SAADA — Echoes of Home.
5. "Forced from Bhutan, deported by the US: these stateless Himalayan people are in a unique limbo." CNN, July 2025.