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Olivia Turcio - Weeks 8 to 10 at Connecticut's Department of Public Health

This marks the end of my NEVBD-TEC internship. I’m very grateful for all of the opportunities I have been given. I connected with many epidemiologists and learned so much from them. I had an amazing time, and I gained so much more knowledge about surveillance. I know that I will be well-prepared for my Master’s courses because of this internship. This also helped solidify what I want to do in the future. When I first started, I honestly had no idea what I wanted to do. I knew that I wanted to pursue infectious disease epidemiology, but the matter of what specific type of infectious diseases and focus was on the back burner. At the end of this internship, I realized that I like working with data but as of right now, I would like to focus on active surveillance. Here is a recap of the last 3 weeks! Week 8 : This week I started conducting my own interviews. After receiving much guidance the previous weeks, I now feel comfortable attempting one by myself. Conducting phone interviews are di...
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Olivia Turcio - Weeks 5 to 7 at Connecticut's Department of Public Health

This marks the halfway point of my NEVBD-TEC internship. I definitely feel more confident using DPH’s resources. I’ve also connected with most of the infectious disease epidemiologists. Everyone is  really friendly   and they always say hi when I’m in the office. I would say that some of the major shifts during these next couple of weeks are my focus on research and interviews. Both are extremely important and this focus will build my confidence in conducting them. Additionally, in terms of research, this will let me get used to data that has already been extracted. Historically, most of my data has been through surveys that were open for 3-4 weeks. It will   definitely be   a nice change of pace to have data that already exists. With interviews, I have done a few, but never on the phone. I would like to see how it’s different from in-person and   Zoom .     Week 5 : This week I continued working on cases in Connecticut Electronic Disease Surveillance ...
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Olivia Turcio - Weeks 1 to 4 at Connecticut's Department of Public Health

This marks the beginning of a series of blogs posts I will be making throughout my NEVBD-TEC internship. I’m teaming up with Connecticut’s Department of Public Health (DPH) where I will be working alongside their Vector-Borne Disease (VBD) team. The goal of the first 4 weeks is to get familiar with VBD surveillance tools and learn more from my advisor and her fellow infectious disease epidemiologists about different vector-borne diseases throughout Connecticut and the Northeast region.   Week 1 : This week was an introduction to what activities I will be conducting throughout this internship. I gained access to a couple of DPH resources and reviewed the Public Health 101 Series on the CDC’s website. I also began learning more about different vector-borne diseases. One task that I worked on was creating different infographics and social media posts about Alpha-gal syndrome. Each post and infographic was curated for a specific audience. I found it really interesting to lear...
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Reece Reckart: GCHD Last Post

 Hey everyone, this has been quite the month, a lot of personal events happened and the start up of school is happening as well so I am sure everyone is quite busy. But don't forget to check yourself for ticks daily, remember the first 24 hours is the most important! The reason I bring that up is because we have the results back from our pathogen test and it really caused me to realize how many times over I could have contracted Lyme's if I wasn't doing my daily checks. This month was mostly just doing data analysis which is a crucial part of the process! It was really fun to help out at the Garrett County Health Department, I got to meet and connect with a lot of people who were able to help me with my job and I was able to help them in whatever way they needed as well, which I think is the most important part of these types of jobs, helping the community and building a level of trust with them so they are not scared to share their opinions and idea's with us! I really...
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Steph Andreescu: Final Weeks with St. Lawrence County Public Health

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Wow, I can't believe the summer is already over and my time with NEVBD has wrapped up! The last couple of weeks have definitely been a rewarding way to close out my summer. One of our recent highlights has been opening a brand-new collection site in our county. After a season spent working at our established sites, it was exciting to set up somewhere new and learn how to set up all the traps in a new area. Another highlight was finally catching Uranotaenia sapphirina, a special species that is the basis of the blood-meal analysis project I mentioned earlier in the summer. It's a tiny mosquito named for its iridescent, sapphire-blue scales that give it a jewel-like shimmer under the microscope. It's unusual among mosquitoes for feeding primarily on invertebrates like earthworms and leeches rather than humans or other vertebrates. I definitely think it's one of the most beautiful mosquitoes we've seen all season, and I've featured a photo I took of one under a mic...
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Isaiah Helmer - My Last Few Weeks with St. Lawrence County Public Health's Mosquito Research Team

       As I finished up my internship with the St. Lawrence County Public Health’s Mosquito Research Team, I took the time to look back on how much I’ve learned and how much more confident I became in my position since the beginning of the summer, and after doing such, I can definitely say that I feel this experience has given me a much better understanding of both field and laboratory work in regards to entomological studies.      Throughout, my routine has stayed fairly consistent. Most mornings had been spent out in the field visiting our collection sites, checking and bringing in CDC, gravid, and DRB collections from our traps. In the afternoons, we brought our collections back to the lab and spent time identifying the mosquitoes under the microscopes down to their exact species. By the end of my time there, I had become much more comfortable with the whole mosquito identification process and rarely needed to rely on the dichotomous key for the spe...
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David Kern - Week 9 & 10 at DNREC!

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Today marked the last day of my internship, and it is very safe to say I will miss it. I have met many amazing researchers, biologists, collectors, and many others! Working under Dr. Ashley Kennedy has not only inspired me to further advance in the world of Medical Entomology, but to be the best student and person I can be.  These last two weeks we have been able to revisit bird-banding, check out many insect collections from the 80's, and enjoy many teambuilding activities! I was also able to participate in the VBD Intern Symposium, where I got to share all of my awesome summer experiences with other interns, as well as see what other labs were studying! This has been one of the best internships I have ever been a part of, and has truly taught me about a whole other world of entomology and public health! Thank you NEVBD, DNREC, and everyone a part of this journey! Celebration of an Amazing Summer!
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