Fenway Health, Boston, MA
This summer I interned at Fenway Health on the PrEP@Home research study, which is a study on retention effects of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) users in telemedicine. PrEP is when people at very high risk for HIV take daily medicine to prevent HIV. Since PrEP users have mandatory quarterly doctor visits, the cost of taking PrEP begins to compound as there are lab copayments, doctor visit copayments, pharmacy copayments and even transportation costs to go to the doctor visits. Because of these costs, it is not uncommon for existing PrEP users to discontinue PrEP and deter others from starting PrEP. Therefore, to combat this problem, my research study tested whether or not it would be more effective for PrEP users to do digital checkups with their doctors via Skype and mail their lab specimens from the comfort of their home.
Every morning, when I arrived at work, I checked the recruitment spreadsheet for new possible participants for the study. Part of my job was to recruit participants, and I grew very comfortable talking to complete strangers about the research and scheduling baseline visits. I also was responsible for the shipments of lab specimens. This required a long list of steps to accurately ship certain specimens, and one mishap may gravely cost one’s research study.
When I wasn’t in the clinic, I did small administrative tasks like organizing cabinets of folders filled with participants’ documents and preparing charts for future participants. I also met with some coworkers who are also planning on going to medical school to gain insight and advice on the whole process. Needless to say, I received more than enough encouraging words and even caveats on the do’s and don’ts for my medical school journey.
This organization is absolutely wonderful. The diversity is staggering as I have never walked into a workplace where more than half of my coworkers are openly part of the LGBTQ+ community. It was incredibly moving for me to work in a place where I genuinely felt that I belonged. In addition to the company’s strive to provide jobs for the LGBTQ+ community, its reputation for being the top leading institute in HIV research, STI research, and LGBTQ+ health research is enough to make anyone impressed. I have the utmost respect for this organization as they have actively served my community since 1971. I wholeheartedly believe that this organization gave me an opportunity to serve my community in a direct way by participating in a research study that could eventually allow more people to afford to take PrEP.
The skills that I have acquired during this internship will definitely be useful for me to navigate my future at Williams. If anything, the joy that I had while learning skills in the clinic and helping out research studies in the office only fuels the fire for me to work even harder in school. I know that I want to come back here and spend my gap year between college and medical school doing research at Fenway Health. This internship has undoubtedly made my intended career path a lot clearer and solidified my dreams of becoming a doctor.
I have also learned a lot about public health and safety in the LGBTQ+ community. Not only am I able to educate my other LGBTQ+ friends at Williams about safe sex practices, but also apply what I learned to my own everyday life. For example, I recently was prescribed PrEP and encouraged all my other friends to do the same. I have noticed that my passion for public health and safety grew even more and I plan to take more public health courses. In addition, working at Fenway Health has also exposed different types and shades of members in the LGBTQ+ community that I had no idea existed. Because of this, I am also thinking of taking more sexuality courses in the future at Williams to become more aware and knowledgeable about my community.
In the end, I am extremely grateful for my experience at Fenway Health. This experience not only helped guide my career trajectory, but also helped me discover a new passion in public health. In addition, the clinical research knowledge that I gained from this internship will definitely be critical for upcoming classes, and sets a solid foundation for future internships. That being said, I thank the Kraft Family for sponsoring this internship in addition to the ’68 Center for Career Exploration for even making this possible. Hopefully I am able to return the favor in the future and allow others to have the same experience that I had.