Hello!

I am currently finishing up my internship at the children’s hospital, working with the staff of the pediatric endocrine clinic, which is focusing on kids and teens with Type 2 diabetes. I have been able to attend meetings on preventing attrition, increasing attendance of follow up appointments, improving patient adherence to protocols and testing related to diabetic monitoring, and assisting in a small study on improving the wait times for the child and their family to see the various practitioners that are participating in their care. I have experienced so much in this internship, as well as understanding the role of the MPH in studies, meetings, activities as a liaison between the INIR and IRB here at the hospital and the staff conducting the clinics.

I am also doing data entry and have been included on a research study within Redcap, which is a data collection site for research studies, and iStar, which has the study participants for our affiliate university, USC.

Much more to learn and observe!

Hello everyone! I have wrapped up my practicum experience this summer, and I had a great time! I chose to work onsite in a fortune 500 company, by assuming the role of a wellness coordinator.  I focused my time on planning, marketing, implementing and analyzing the results of a nutrition intervention and education program. I also developed policies and guidelines on healthy vending machine and catering options, met with other key members in the corporate wellness sector, and attended meetings with regards to employee wellness. I collaborated with various professional organizations throughout St. Louis and created partnerships for future projects. My main project was designing and implementing a nutrition intervention program. Cooking has always been a large part of my personal life, preparing foods at home for family, friends, and coworkers. So by bringing my passion for cooking into the corporate wellness field, my goal was to show employees that cooking healthy meals does not have to be time consuming, expensive, or tasteless!

My intervention was three weeks long, with two sessions each week on Tuesday during the lunch hours. The study design was a pre/post evaluation to assess whether or not the participants had improved their knowledge, attitude, and behavior with regards to heart healthy eating and cooking at home. Each week was focused on a food group (whole grains, protein, and dairy) and specifically heart healthy eating. For each session, I focused on the health benefits of the food group of the week, ways to choose heart healthy options, proper serving sizes, and discussing an overall heart healthy diet prior to diving into the cooking demonstration half of the session. For the whole grains class, I made homemade 5 ingredient granola bars and a three-grain cold breakfast cereal. For the protein class, I made homemade hummus and a silky tofu fruit dip. And for the dairy class, each participant got to make their own homemade frozen yogurt by shaking it in a bag full of ice and salt. I also made black bean brownies (SO TASTY). Overall, the intervention was a success, and they got the entire building talking about the three sessions. I received great feedback and many employees wish to see more cooking demonstrations in the future. It was a great learning opportunity working with my site supervisors, and I enjoyed being able to complete this intervention from start to finish.

I have been active in my practicum with our local Aging, Disabilities & Resource Center (ADRC) Senior Nutrition Program working on local foods initiatives. The beginning of my practicum started off pretty slow and somewhat rocky, which was frustrating. I originally planned on working through our local Division of Public Health with a Farmers Market initiative; however, I accepted a promotion to WIC program supervisor and felt there would be a conflict of interest working with the WIC FMNP program and farmers market with Public Health. So, I got a little bit of a late start with my practicum hours as I transition to the ADRC. My initial task was to analyze their menu for local foods. It was concluded that there was little to no local foods offered or promoted through the senior dining program in Portage County.

This practicum has been a positive learning experience, learning to juggle my new work responsibilities, personal and family obligations in addition to practicum hours. So far, I have helped gather local data and submitted 2 local food/revitalization grants specifically for Wisconsin senior dining programs. This week we received confirmation that we were awarded $15,000 to work on these two new initiatives by incorporating local foods into our senior dining program to help make Portage County seniors healthier and to increase participation. One of the grants focuses on partnering with Central Wisconsin Farmshed-a non-profit local sustainable food resource center to purchase local produce from area farmers throughout the growing season to incorporate at least 1 serving of local fruits or vegetables every other week year round.  The other grant focuses on partnering with a local fitness club and bistro. Our vision is to provide a restaurant voucher model to senior dining which incorporates healthy lifestyles and activities at the fitness club while promoting healthy, local and affordable food options at the bistro.

I have also developed a local foods survey which will be administered soon to seniors in the community and those who dine with Portage County senior dining.

I am very pleased with the progress so far in my practicum experience and look forward to sharing more information soon!