Summer 2019
Sebastian Bidegain
Location: Mexico City, Mexico
Organization: Centro de Investigacion en Enfermedades Infecciosas (CIENI) and Clinica Condesa
I spent my summer abroad in Mexico City, gaining a broad range of clinical experiences in HIV and other infectious diseases. I began my first few weeks at a lab called Centro de Investigacion en Enfermedades Infecciosas (CIENI). This lab is responsible for advanced diagnostic processing of all HIV tissue and serum samples in the country. Here I learned about Sanger Sequencing and Next Generation Sequencing of HIV genes associated with multi-drug resistance. This gave me a solid understanding what steps are taken when a patient is not responding to antiretroviral treatment...Read more
Maneesha Chitanvis
Location: Quito, Ecuador
Organization: Child Family Health International (CFHI)
I spent the summer of 2019 in and around Quito, Ecuador as a medical student intern with Child Family Health International (CFHI). CFHI is an organization with global health education program and field experiences in a number of countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia. The core values of the organization align with my own personal values as they are committed to encouraging professional development through community engagement in a way that highlights the healthcare workers, health systems, and determinants of health in low-resource settings...Read more
Jessica Lu
Location: Cusco, Peru
Organization: CerviCusco
I spent eight weeks in Cusco, Peru working at a women’s health clinic called CerviCusco. The clinic was located in a cozy neighborhood about 30 minutes away from downtown, and I lived in a dorm-style apartment complex above the clinic with other American medical and physician assistant student volunteers. Most of my days were spent collecting data for my research project which focused on understanding Peruvian women’s attitudes and knowledge about breast cancer and screening practices through a survey-based study. Our target population was women ages 40+, and we usually went into local marketplaces to chat with the women working and administered surveys. This was my first time working extensively on a population-based survey study...Read more
Summer 2018
Elena Beideck
Location: Cusco, Peru
Organization: CerviCusco
I spent the summer living in Cusco, Peru and participating in two research projects associated with a clinic called CerviCusco, a Peruvian NGO that provides women’s health services and has a focus on reducing the incidence and prevalence of cervical cancer among Peruvian women. On a typical day, I would either work in the clinic itself or at a mobile campaign in another area of Cusco or in a surrounding region. I worked primarily with survey administration for both the HPV vaccination compliance, and Papanicolaou test follow-up projects...Read more
Summer 2016
Lauren Antrim
Location: Lima, Peru
Organization: Universidad Peruano Cayetano Heredia
Lauren spent eight weeks at Universidad Peruano Cayetano Heredia under the mentorship of Dr. Patricia Garcia newly named Minister of Health for Peru. Her project focused on the disparities in Peru’s healthcare system with regards to screening and diagnosis of cervical dysplasia. She gathered data through literature searches as well as interviews with gynecologists, pathologists, and midwives. During her experience she also had the opportunity to conduct significant research into other countries use of HPV screening as a tool for population based screening.
Andre´ Belarmino
Location: Lima, Peru
Organization: Universidad Peruano Cayetano Heredia
Andre participated in a project involving Pap smear coverage in a specific Peruvian region during 2015. Under the guidance of his host mentor, Dr. Patricia Garcia, newly named Minister of Health for Peru, he conducted a retrospective analysis of more than 500 women, looking specifically at the trajectory of the patients’ medical encounters from positive Pap smear results through cervical cancer treatment. Through the results, Andre was able to identify barriers to care and drop-off in follow-up at every step of the care continuum and propose possible solutions. He hopes to continue this work by analyzing the cost and feasibility of “screen-and-treat” screening using visualization with acetic acid (VIA) and HPV DNA testing.
Cody Patrick Nolan
Location: Lima, Peru
Organization: Hospital Nacional Dos de Mayo
Cody spent eight weeks in Lima, Peru assisting with two research projects spearheaded by Infectious Disease expert, Dr. Robert Gilman. The first project involved neurological syndromes in HIV-positive patients. Cody attended rounds and case presentations, reviewed charts and admissions for new patients and conducted the enrollment process with the help of a Peruvian physician. The second project was writing a research paper for a nearly completed study, jointly conducted by Dr. Gilman and a Peruvian researcher, Dr. Zimic, that looked at eye tracking technology for early diagnosis of autism. He hopes to return to Peru, or potentially Bolivia, in order to continue working with Dr. Gilman.
Qianjing (Jenny) Xia
Location: Port-au-Prince, Haiti
Organization: GHESKIO
Qianjing participated in a summer project in Haiti. For the first 3 weeks, she rotated with social workers, psychologists, and doctors in counseling, TB, HIV, STI, adolescent, and pediatric clinics. For the subsequent 3 weeks, she assisted WCM’s Dr. Katherine Walsh in a clinical phase II trial looking at the early bactericidal activity of a new drug for pulmonary tuberculosis. Her roles included recruiting patients and confirming collection and delivery of samples by working with the TB clinicians, nurses and pathology lab. Qianjing found that close, detailed coordination and personal interactions were crucial to conducting successful clinical research.
Katharine Wilcox
Location: Lima, Peru
Organization: Universidad Peruano Cayetano Heredia
Katharine spent her summer in Lima, Peru at la Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia. Working under the guidance of her host mentor, Dr. Patricia Garcia, newly named Minister of Health of Peru, Katharine participated in a project involving Pap smear coverage in the urban slum of Ventanilla, Callao, Peru. Her responsibilities included tracking the trajectory of patients’ medical encounters from Pap smear through cervical cancer treatment. From the results of the investigation, she learned that the current methods of cervical cancer prevention and treatment are inadequate for addressing the population’s needs. She hopes to further this work by analyzing “screen-and-treat” programs as possible solutions.
Summer 2015
Eric Kutscher
Location: Port-au-Prince, Haiti
Organization: GHESKIO
During his eight week experience with GHESKIO, Eric worked on a few different projects under the guidance of Dr. Dan Fitzgerald and Dr. Molly McNairy. One project was a study on health outcomes among HIV positive patients who have been on antiretroviral medications for 10 years. Eric’s responsibilities for the project included organizing lab results for patients, collecting and entering information into databases. He also worked on another project on tracking Tuberculosis attrition data among teenagers, in which he focused on transcribing data from old registries into an Excel document, and will work on the study’s data analysis going forward.