We asked public health students and recent graduates to share their "why" - what motivated them to pursue this degree and profession. Here are more of their stories. Rebecca Miller, MPH, MS, Case Western Reserve University Throughout my life, I've witnessed many in my community go through health challenges and…
This morning I woke up with the sun. Birds were singing as the sun rose over the mountains to the east, and I rolled over to watch colors fill the sky. As the sun grew stronger, I wrapped myself in my sheet to keep cool at an altitude of 8,667…
There are many textbooks available to provide an introduction to epidemiology and data analysis. As I was preparing for my qualifying exams for a PhD in epidemiology, I received a recommendation to explore the book Making Sense of Data from a professor at my university. This book is comprehensive in…
Relationships – be they professional, romantic, platonic, or familial – govern and guide our interactions and wellbeing as humans: in our most exposed and naked form, we are social animals. As public health scientists, we identify and research relationships, primarily between exposures and outcomes. But these terms are empty buckets…
Public health is an inherently transdisciplinary field. ((Haire-Joshu D, McBride TD. Transdisciplinary public health: Research, education, and practice. Vol 49: John Wiley & Sons; 2013.)) While some programs build truly transdisciplinary curriculum, others still employ a siloed approach. In both types of programs, an epidemiology course may cover statistical methodologies…
As a Senior Fellow at the University of Washington School of Public Health, Dr. Sarah Andrea's (@SarahBAndrea) research investigates strategies to mitigate gender, racial, and class-based inequities in health that originate early in the life course. I had the pleasure of meeting Sarah Andrea years ago, when I first started…
In Oedipus Rex, a blind prophet named Tiresias tells Oedipus that he is the murderer he seeks and predicts that he will become a blind wanderer who was exiled from his own kingdom, all of which proves true to Oedipus’ dismay. Although I am no Tiresias with the ability to…
(Or, how to work with animals and get paid for it) First Exposure My first exposure to veterinary medicine as a public health discipline was while working in a high-volume spay and neuter clinic. There, I saw hundreds of feral cats come through our trap-neuter-return (TNR) program and be released…
