Spring 2005 Issue
Medical Student Mehul Tejani Experiences CDC, Explores Career Opportunities in Public Health
On December 2, 2003, Mehul Tejani and his academic advisor at Baylor College of Medicine dialed the phone number of Karen Torghele, program coordinator of The CDC Experience Applied Epidemiology Fellowship. Applications for the program were due in just three days.
Mehul wasn’t looking to take a year off. He was really looking for something extra a unique learning experience that would complement his medical school education. He had read the description of the program on the CDC Foundation Web site: “a year-long fellowship for physicians-in-training that combines classroom instruction in epidemiology and biostatistics with hands-on field investigations of disease outbreaks and other public health threats.” The program sounded appealing, but he wasn¹t sure if it would fit his current experience and future career goals.
As a physician-in-training, Mehul was learning how to treat individual patients, not how to address the health issues of whole populations. Interested in broadening his perspective, he periodically met with fellow students to discuss the role of public health in professional medical practice, but he had few formal opportunities to learn about public health.
That afternoon, Torghele encouraged him to apply for The CDC Experience, emphasizing that CDC was seeking a diverse group of fellows with varying degrees of experience. Convinced that The CDC Experience was the “something extra” that would give him hands-on training in public health, Mehul quickly completed and submitted his application and was selected as one of eight fellows in the inaugural class of The CDC Experience. He is now in Atlanta working with his CDC mentor to analyze data that will help CDC improve prevention and control programs for sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).
The CDC Experience was the brainchild of Barbara DeBuono, M.D., M.P.H., senior medical director of Pfizer’s Public Health Group. Like Mehul, as a medical student DeBuono wanted a hands-on experience in public health. At that time CDC had a short, eight-week program for medical students called the “CDC Epi Elective.” To participate, DeBuono had to get special permission from her school to complete this rotation at CDC during her fourth year.
Recognizing both the value of that experience and the critical need of inspiring and training the next generation of public health leaders, DeBuono and her team, the Pfizer Public Health Group, began to explore the idea of creating a CDC-based program for medical students.
DeBuono contacted CDC Foundation president and CEO Charlie Stokes, who she knew could be a key partner in developing the program. “We sought out CDC, working through the CDC Foundation, to determine the type of in-depth learning experience that would be most beneficial to identifying and developing future medical epidemiologists and disease detectives,” says DeBuono. Watching Mehul and the seven other fellows learn about CDC and their potential to contribute to public health solutions is a long-awaited reward for her and the other program organizers.
For Mehul, The CDC Experience has provided many new experiences - some surprising.
His primary research projects involve using insurance claims data to determine the financial costs of STDs and to analyze correlations between the incidence of STDs and certain risk factors. He uses the data to answer questions such as: What is the cost-per-case of trichomoniasis? Do individuals who take certain prescription drugs engage in high-risk sexual behaviors? Does having a mental illness increase the risk of contracting an STD? Does having an STD affect mental health? Answers to these questions will lay the groundwork for future CDC studies focused on how best to address STD prevention and control.
While Mehul is not surprised by the findings of his analysis, he is amazed at the level of flexibility he has had in designing and conducting his research project. He notes that this flexibility has extended beyond his specific project. “We are encouraged to seek out and learn from various professionals at CDC, even about topics that interest us outside of our project areas.”
The CDC Experience also encourages the fellows to learn from one another through journal clubs, seminars and other discussion-based learning opportunities. “I’ve been impressed by how passionate and motivated the fellows are about the work they¹re doing,” says Mehul. “We’re a diverse group geographically and ethnically. Everyone has very good ideas, and it’s fun to see how people think, based on the different paths they have taken.” Noting the many differences between the fellowship and the typical medical school experience Mehul says, “There’s no competition between us; everything we do is intended to help each other out.”
Mehul benefited from this egalitarian camaraderie when CDC invited one student to join a CDC team doing epidemiological field work in Florida after the 2004 hurricanes. The other fellows offered Mehul the opportunity since their projects, unlike Mehul’s, would involve substantial field work later in the year. So, in October, Mehul found himself in Florida, going door-to-door requesting urine samples for a study to determine the exposure of local residents to aerial pesticide sprays. The hurricanes in Florida left a lot of standing water, providing breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Health officials in Florida used the aerial pesticide sprays to kill the mosquitoes and help stop the potential spread of mosquito-borne diseases like West Nile virus. Mehul and the other researchers from CDC, the EPA and the Florida Department of Health wanted to determine how much of the pesticide, if any, could be detected in urine samples from local residents. “It was neat to see that we weren’t always in the office,” reports Mehul. “We got to be in the field and help real people.”
While Mehul says it’s still too early to definitively state his career goals, he acknowledges that The CDC Experience has sparked “a larger consideration for a career where I would see a broader variety of patients, rather than something more specialized, and where I would have opportunities to help improve community health on a larger scale whether through research, advocacy or teaching.”
“Our goal in this program is to develop physicians with a population health perspective, a clear need identified by many, including the Institute of Medicine” says Denise Koo, M.D., M.P.H., director of the Career Development Division of CDC’s Office of Workforce and Career Development. “Thus far, the program and the fellows have really exceeded our expectations, and regardless of their specific career paths, they will be future leaders and players in the health arena.”
- Shannon Easley