Thank you, AzHHA!

Dear Marcus and Barb,

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to intern at Arizona Healthcare and Hospital Association. I have learned so much in such a short amount of time.

I appreciate your dedication to the team each week and spending time with us to help us grow and discover more about the Phoenix community. I very much enjoyed the weekly field trips and learning opportunities such as hearing from various professionals in the healthcare industry. Clearly you were passionate about the interns learning as much as possible and helping us grow as individuals.

Without this opportunity I would not have been able to talk with so many different people or get a chance to see what people are passionate when it comes to healthcare and health in general. I was able to have conversations with people in a different way. I have learned that it is important to talk about health with your friends and family because you can really gain a lot of insights about that person.

Thank you for the chance to learn more about myself as team member as well as a leader. You provided us with multiple opportunities to shine as individuals as well as adapting to working as part of a larger organization.

I look forward to taking what I have learned at AzHHA and applying it to my future career path as well as other organizations I may work at. I will always look upon my experience here at AzHHA very fondly.

Sincerely,
Lauren Lynch

What I learned working at AzHHA

Well, my internship has come to an end and the semester is close to being completed too. I have really enjoyed this semester and have learned a lot both at my internship and in my courses. I went into this semester with positive thoughts of meeting new people as well as my goals.

For my internship specifically I had listed three goals at the beginning which were:

• Identify approaches that effectively motivate voter turnout in upcoming elections
• Build a grassroots network that can be mobilized for public support in future health initiatives
• Conduct and analyze a collection of qualitative interviews to discover health-related affinities within various sub-populations, thereby building empathy between those populations and AzHHA. 

These goals were based on what I had heard the internship would be about and are not specifically centered around my own personal growth but I find I learn the most when I have goals that are product focused and I learn more about myself along the way.

If you haven't been following my blog specifically or you can recall, I have been working at AzHHA, a nonprofit organization as part of a team of 12 interns. Each week we went out into the community and interviewed different types of people, my group focused on people 65+ , and asked those people general healthcare/health related questions.

The first goal was accomplished because I was able to interview so many different people and find out what really mattered to them. I learned that older people are more likely to gain health information via standard mail and from their peers and they really enjoy talking to younger generations, but not so much hearing from younger generations. 

The second goal was also achieved, if you don't know what grassroots networking is it is going into the community and talking to the people, and with each person you meet with you get contact information for another person, essentially building a long chain of people you can call and connect with to talk about a specific issue. In this situation it would be used to talk to people about voting a certain way.

Lastly, my team and I conducted over thirty interviews with each interview lasting about an hour. We found what makes people over 65+ passionate about their health, how they feel about healthcare, and learned best how to communicate with them.

If you would like to view our presentation you can view it here

Research Assistant Update

Hello everyone,

Just thought I would update you on the status of my research assistant role. If you read my previous posts you would see that I am currently assisting two professors investigating postdoctoral training. I have loved learning more about this topic and what students do after they get their Ph.D.

However school has definitely caught up to me and I feel very overwhelmed with the whole process. I don't have very much time and I have a lot of articles to read and analyze in order to be of support. I hope that I can manage to set aside some time to catch up or I somehow become a super fast reader (ha!). I have been in correspondence with my professors so they are flexible.

I suppose that's just how it goes at the end of the semester! Anyone have any good time managing tips or tips for keeping focused?


Thanks.

Career Services: Grad School

In one of my earlier posts I mentioned how I was looking into grad schools. Recently, I signed up for my GRE prep course so time is moving quickly. For this assignment, I went to find out more about future grad schools. I had actually researched a dual program between ASU and the University of Minnesota. The event was not explicitly posted on the Career Services website but it was a similar type event.

The University of Minnesota staff came down to talk with students at the downtown campus about their Nutrution & Public Policy/Public Health programs. I had a chance to meet with Andy, a representative of the program to talk more about it. He answered a lot of my questions and I was actually really interested in the program because it allows me to stay at ASU. The program is unique because it allows you to live in ASU and then spend summer's interning in Minnesota. The degree does not mention anything about ASU but you get the benefits of both university. 

Andy referred me Marjorie Baldwin who works at ASU and I decided to meet with her too in order to hear more about the program. I met with her in hopes of meeting current grad students in the program, but haven't heard from back her yet. 

Internships in the future

I have loved being an intern mostly because I have been able to learn so much and see the impact of my work on the organization and on the community. Being an intern is great because it really does allow you to grow as an individual. I still have two semesters left at ASU and would love to participate in other internships.

I recently saw a flyer to intern next semester at the Office of the Mayor, Greg Stanton, in downtown Phoenix. I missed the deadline to apply but emailed the person in charge at the office anyways and he made an exception and allowed me to send in my resume. Well, I recently had an interview and I think it went really well. The interview was very casual and I felt like it was more of a friendly conversation.

I would love to intern for the Mayor's office because it would give me experience at the city level, as much as I love working for a nonprofit I think it would be great to see the differences in the organizations. The man I met with at the office, Doug gave me a general overview of the projects. It sounded like I would be paired with different staff to help with projects of interest, from drafting policy to helping write a speech for the Mayor. I would also have the opportunity to go to public hearings or meetings that the Mayor attends in order to provide notes or other types of support.

Even though my schedule is so busy for next semester, I think it would be such an amazing opportunity. I find out in a week or so if I get accepted to the internship program.

Strengths of AzHHA

As you may know at this point I have been interning for an amazing organization called the Arizona Hospital and Healthcare Association (AzHHA). I recently had an opportunity to meet with the CEO of the organization, Greg Vigdor who gave us interns an overview of AzHHA. Greg is relatively new at AzHHA and came over from another nonprofit health organization at Washington State. Greg shared with us his vision for AzHHA and Arizona in general in that he hopes for Arizona to be the healthiest state in the nation. This is obviously quite a far reaching vision but I think it captures the spirit of AzHHA.

Greg and his staff work closely together and the office has a very positive, happy vibe. I think this positive environment is a strength of AzHHA and makes the staff more productive. The staff have a lot of freedom to come and go when they need and it allows them to spend more time with their family. I would love to work in an organization like this so that I too can spend time with my family when needed. Greg also has a very large white board in his office where he has a collection of ideas, goals, and other information that helps him brainstorm for AzHHA. I love that Greg's ideas are so transparent to others at AzHHA.

Overall, I would not change very much about AzHHA and I love the environment that Greg and the staff have created. Sometimes I think that the staff are often not present enough and it is hard to find them because they do have so much freedom and flexibility. I think a universal vision and a strong CEO are really the true strengths of AzHHA and it is really something that should be implemented at other nonprofits.

Field trip to Enemy Territory

So I have terrible news. During my internship we were forced to go behind enemy lines to the U of A Medical Center downtown. Fortunately many of my fellow interns are also ASU students so we banded together and even chanted "Go ASU!" a few times while in the building.

All joking aside, I really enjoyed this tour because it was amazing to see the new technology at work in the medical center. Before, med students often had to practice sutures on pig's feet but now they have real life skin samples that are kept wet to maintain moisture and realism. It was incredible  to see all the new technology. Our tour guide reminded us that while med students do have access to great technology many students do not know how to respond when technology doesn't work so they aim to give students a well rounded experience and solutions on how to respond if traditional medical technology is not available.

My favorite part of the tour was the simulation lab. I have worked in a simulation lab before so it was really cool being reunited with the mannequins (no they aren't called dummies). I had never seen a mother and baby simulation before so I got to experience that. I will attach a picture of this experience below. I was amazed at the baby, it felt so real.

While U of A may be a natural Sun Devil enemy, I was truly impressed to see how advanced the school was and how dedicated the staff are in ensuring that their students are fully prepared to work in our medical community.