The Department of Global Health awarded 35 international travel fellowships this spring to support the projects and research of graduate and professional students and medical residents at UW for the next academic year. Thirty-five students from varied disciplines across the University, including global health, nursing, epidemiology, medicine, anthropology, psychology, and pharmacy, will travel to  seventeen countries pursuing fieldwork experience. Projects range from understanding how social contexts affect the acquisition of HIV and STIs in Kenya to evaluating integration of mobile health technology for maternal and child health in Timor-Leste to exploring barriers and facilitators to implementing an indigenous health system in Colombia.

Administered by the Global Health Resource Center, the Department's five travel fellowships are funded through the generous donations of private individuals and organizations, as well as support from the Department of Global Health. Learn more about the Global Health Resource Center's fellowships for fieldwork here. 

Warren George Povey Endowed Fund for Global Health Students
Global Opportunities (GO) Health Fellowship
Strengthening Care Opportunities Through Partnership in Ethiopia (SCOPE) Fellowship
Stergachis Endowed Fellowship for International Exchange
​Thomas Francis, Jr. Global Health Fellowship

WARREN GEORGE POVEY ENDOWED FUND FOR GLOBAL HEALTH STUDENTS

Haley Millet, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Tanzania
Project: Increasing Health Service Access Among Vulnerable Women and Children 

Haley Millet is a first year MPH candidate in the Department of Global Health. Through her engagement with rural communities in Central Uganda over the last seven years, Haley has worked on issues of gender equity and reproductive control, food security, and community based participatory development. This year, funded by the Warren George Povey Fellowship, she will join Health Tanzania Foundation in Dar es Salaam as an implementation partner for the Interfaith Community Grant. The grant seeks to increase health service access to vulnerable women and children as well as mobilize communities around issues of substance use and mental health. In the long term, Haley seeks to contribute to the decolonization of global health and development by working in solidarity with communities and uplifting local knowledge. 

 

GLOBAL OPPORTUNITIES (GO) HEALTH FELLOWSHIP

Dana Atkins, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Kenya
Project: How Social Contexts Affect the Acquisition of HIV, STIs

Dana Atkins is a first year MPH student in the Department of Global Health (General Track). Her interest is in how social contexts affect the acquisition of HIV, STIs and other negative reproductive health outcomes in communities; with a special interest in Kenya and South Africa. Her thesis work will be with the Kenya Research and Training Center (KRTC). Through this fellowship, she will be travelling to Kisumu, Kenya this summer to conduct focus group discussions with health care workers to assess perspectives on using financial incentives to incentivize pediatric HIV testing. 

Danae Black, PhD student, Department of Epidemiology | Kenya
Project: Transitioning from Pediatric to Adult HIV Care

Danae Black is a PhD student in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Washington (UW). Danae received her MPH in Global Health Epidemiology from the George Washington University. Danae's research interests include tuberculosis, global health, maternal and child health, and infectious disease epidemiology. Since at UW, she has continued pursing her research interests in TB, specifically within an implementation science study among HIV-infected adolescents. The “Transitioning from Pediatric to Adult HIV Care in Kenya” study aims to assess co-factors for effective transition of pediatric HIV individuals from pediatric to adult health care services. Danae hopes to specifically investigate associations with TB screening, preventive treatment, and overall burden among HIV-infected adolescents in this study. This fellowship will provide her with funds to go to Kenya to conduct facility surveys aimed to identify transition and TB prevention services reported and observe integrated TB-HIV care strategies across multiple facilities in Kenya.

Shelley Brandstetter, PhD candidate, Nursing Practice | Kenya
Project: Training Human Milk Banking Staff

Shelley Brandstetter is a second-year Doctorate of Nursing Practice student in the Pediatric Nurse Practitioner Track, and a student in the Global Health of Women, Adolescents, and Children certificate program. She currently works at Seattle Children’s Hospital in the recovery room, and hopes to work in pediatric primary care in Seattle and continue working on global health projects upon graduation. Last summer as a graduate student intern with PATH’s Human Milk Banking Team, Shelley developed an adaptable training tool intended to be adapted for global use for training human milk banking staff. She is excited to have the opportunity to travel to Kenya this summer to implement this training at Kenyatta National Hospital during implementation of the region’s first human milk bank. Human milk banks provide vulnerable infants with donor human milk, as recommended by the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and other professional bodies. To date, there are no global standards for human milk banking, therefore any tools developed for global use must be both adaptable and ensure high quality processes.

Sofia De Anda, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Kenya
Project: Community Needs Assessment in Merrueshi Village

Sofia De Anda is a first year student pursuing an MPH from the Department of Global Health. She graduated from the University of Texas at El Paso with a BA in Sociology. After her undergraduate degree she participated in a research project conducting in-depth interviews examining exposure to air pollution and hazard mitigation in Houston and Miami. Shortly after she became an Economic Development volunteer with the Peace Corps in Paraguay working in youth development, sexual health, and civic participation projects. In addition to being a student, Sofia is a Research Assistant working on the scale up of the assisted partner services project in Kenya. Thanks to the GO Health Fellowship, she will complete her practicum in the Merrueshi Village, where she will conduct a community needs assessment.

Samantha Dolan, PhD student, Implementation Science, Department of Global Health | Kenya
Project: Assessing an Electronic Immunization Registry

Samantha is in her second year of the Global Health, Implementation Science, PhD program in the Department of Global Health. She will use her fellowship to assess the usability, fidelity, and sustainability of an electronic immunization registry introduced in one county of Kenya to inform future upgrades and scale-up’s of this intervention to other parts of the country. This assessment will provide the Ministry of Health with highly valuable information about how best to modify the registry and address current barriers and challenges to implementation. Samantha works at I-TECH as a research and evaluation adviser for multiple projects focusing on health information systems. Prior to joining the Department of Global Health, she conducted program operations research for immunization programs at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  

Jaclyn Escudero, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Kenya
Project: PrEP Uptake Among Adolescent Girls and Young Women 

Jaclyn is a first-year MPH student in the Department of Global Health. She previously attended the George Washington University in Washington, DC, where she received a bachelor’s degree in Psychology. As a Peace Corps Volunteer, she served two years in rural Cameroon, partnering with community members to promote improved health practices in the areas of hygiene and sanitation, HIV/AIDS, and family planning. Jaclyn is currently a research assistant with the Global Center for Integrated Health of Women, Adolescents, and Children (Global WACh), supporting a research team on two large-scale implementation science projects involving delivery of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to prevent HIV infection in women and adolescent girls in western Kenya. With the support of the GO Health Fellowship, Jaclyn will build on this work, elucidating narratives on PrEP uptake and adherence experiences, through in-depth interviews with adolescent girls and young women and focus groups with healthcare workers and community stakeholders.

Dylan Green,  PhD student, Department of Epidemiology | Vietnam
Project: Prevention of HIV in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City

Dylan Green is a second year PhD student in the Epidemiology Department. Prior to beginning the PhD program at the University of Washington, Dylan conducted economic evaluations as a Health Economist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the Division for Global HIV/AIDS. He hopes to further his training in health economics, epidemiology, and mathematical modeling through a GO Fellowship-supported research project in Vietnam. He intends to assess the risk behavior of men who have sex with men and transgender women (MSMTG) seeking pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) for the prevention of HIV in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. He will also assess the cost of PrEP provision and estimate the cost-effectiveness of PrEP for MSMTG in Vietnam using a mathematical model. These findings will be valuable to policy makers who aim to finance the highest impact HIV program. 

Mercy Joyce, Medical student, School of Medicine | Nepal
Project: Tracking Behaviors, Outcomes, and Disparities Associated with Preventable Diseases 

Mercy Joyce is a first year medical student at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Mercy Joyce is selected to be part of the Medical Student Research Training Program where she participates in a longitudinal and individually mentored research experience. With the GO fellowship, Mercy plans to implement a stroke and MI registry in Dhulikhel Hospital in Nepal. The goal of the registry is to track behaviors, outcomes, and disparities associated with the common preventable diseases near the districts of Dhulikhel Hospital. It will be the first initiative directed towards creating a unified database that stands as a resource for future research and policy work.  

Kathryn Kemper, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Namibia
Project: Analyzing National Cervical Cancer Screening Data

Kathryn is pursuing a MPH in the Department of Global Health. Prior to this program, she worked at HealthPoint, a community health center in King County, developing and implementing a population health colorectal cancer screening program. Before moving to Washington, she worked with a foundation in Santa Cruz, CA that focused on building capacity of community-based organizations in Sub-Saharan Africa. She graduated from UC Santa Cruz in 2015. With the support of the GO Health Fellowship, Kathryn will work with I-TECH and the Namibia Ministry of Health to collect and analyze national cervical cancer screening data to inform the rollout of a population health screening method. She will also engage with healthcare workforce to document their needs in regard to strengthening monitoring and evaluation efforts at the health facility level. Kathryn is passionate about cancer prevention and reproductive health and excited to collaborate with and learn from experts in Namibia.

Aisha King, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Kenya
Project: Psychological and public health research

Aisha King is a first-year MPH student in the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington. She graduated from Bard College in 2015 with a bachelor’s degree in psychology, and has spent her academic career focusing on psychological and public health research. Her past work has spanned a variety of health-related areas; from writing on immigrant health issues in upstate New York, to providing crisis intervention counseling to college students, to researching men’s attitudes on a novel male contraceptive. She later volunteered with Partnership Nepal, a Kathmandu-based NGO working towards the empowerment of women and children displaced by the 2015 earthquake. Before starting the Master’s program, she traveled for 11 months and experienced cultures around the world. Her current research interests include male contraception, global mental health, and firearm injury prevention. In her free time you can find her doing handstands, practicing yoga, or reading in the sun. 

Liu Gui, PhD student, Department of Epidimiology l Switzerland
Project: Analyzing HIV and cervical cancer screening data at UNAIDs

Gui is currently a second year PhD student in the Department of Epidemiology. Her dissertation research focuses on cervical cancer prevention among women living with HIV. Prior to starting her PhD program, Gui was a research analyst at the Centers for Disease and Prevention, where she worked with nationally representative survey data to monitor HPV prevalence and the population-level impact of HPV vaccination in the US. With funding from GO Health Fellowship, Gui will work with UNAIDS to analyze HIV and cervical cancer screening data from countries all over the world. This work will help to identify epidemiological trends and to assess individual country’s progress towards meeting the relevant Sustainable Development Goals. Through this experience, Gui hopes to gain a better understanding of the epidemiology of HIV and cervical cancer globally. Gui received her undergraduate degree in Psychology from Georgetown University and her Masters in Public Health from Emory University.

Natasha Ludwig-Barron, PhD student, Department of Epidemiology | Kenya
Project: Understanding Environmental Risk Factors that Impact HIV Care 

Natasha Ludwig-Barron, MPH, is a second-year PhD student in Epidemiology at the University of Washington. Her research interests fall within the syndemic of HIV/AIDS, substance use, and gender inequity, with the goal of improving the health and well-being of marginalized communities. After earning an MPH at Emory University, she earned a fellowship through the Hispanic-Serving Health Professions Schools to conducted HIV and substance use research along the U.S.-Mexico Border, and later served as an Epidemiologist with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.  She received a GO-Health Fellowship to conduct research in Nairobi, Kenya, with established needle exchange programs for her dissertation. Her research incorporates a mixed methods design in order to better understand environmental risk factors that impact HIV care among HIV-positive, persons whom inject drugs (PWID). This work will characterize the Nairobi-specific risk environment factors and assess these factors by applying the HIV care continuum as an underlying framework.

Ma Chen-Yu, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Timor-Leste
Project: Evaluating Integration of Mobile Health Technology for Maternal and Child Health

Originally from Taiwan, Chen-Yu is a Master of Public Health candidate in the Department of Global Health. He holds Bachelor’s degrees in Medical Anthropology and Biology from the University of Washington. He is dedicated to improving health for the underserved communities in the U.S. and abroad. During his undergraduate years, Chen-Yu volunteered as a health educator for a non-profit organization that provides preventative care to homeless communities in Seattle. He also served people with HIV/AIDS and patients who needed end-of-life care in Bailey-Boushay House. Prior to attending graduate school, Chen-Yu served in the Peace Corps, where he collaborated with community health centers and Catholic Relief Services in rural Madagascar to improve maternal and child health (MCH) by enhancing access to primary health care services and health knowledge. As a fellowship recipient, he will conduct an evaluation of integration of mHealth program for MCH into the Ministry of Health in Timor-Leste.

Sarah Maze, Medical student, School of Medicine | Nepal
Project: Sustainable Educational Tools for Women with Gestational Diabetes

Sarah Maze is a UW WWAMI medical student and will be traveling to Dhulikhel, Nepal in conjunction with the Global Health Immersion Program and Global Opportunities Health Fellowship. While there, she looks forward to partnering with the community of Dhulikhel and surrounding outreach clinics to understand the intersection between Nepalese culture and medicine, and to continue exploring her passion for rural healthcare. Her project aim is to develop sustainable, comprehensive educational tools and practices for women with gestational diabetes. Prior to UW, Sarah attended the University of Wyoming and attained a BS in Physiology, with a minor in neuroscience, and a BA in Spanish. Currently, she is involved in the Global Health and Hispanic Health pathways. Sarah hopes to utilize skills and strategies gained through this experience to advocate for increased access to health care in rural and underserved areas in her future career.

Kathryn Peebles, PhD student, Department of Epidemiology | Nepal
Project: Evaluating the Impact of Biomedical HIV Prevention Interventions

Kathryn is a PhD student in the department of Epidemiology at UW. Her research focuses on the use of mathematical models to evaluate the impact of biomedical HIV prevention interventions, including evaluation of cost-effectiveness of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) in implementation settings and estimation of how behavioral factors may reduce intervention impact in both clinical trial and implementation contexts. As a GO Health Fellow, Kathryn will assess the cost of providing PrEP in Kenya’s public sector. Through this experience, Kathryn looks forward to gaining extensive practice in primary data collection, providing capacity-building trainings in health economic and mathematical modeling methods, and strengthening her network of Kenya-based colleagues and collaborators.

Lesley Steinman, PhD student, Department of Health Services | Cambodia
Project: Closing the Mental Health Treatment Gap 

Lesley Steinman, MSW, MPH is a first year PhD student in the UW School of Public Health’s Department of Health Services. A UW alum, Ms. Steinman received her MSW in Contextual Practice in 2004 and MPH in Social and Behavioral Sciences in 2006. Lesley is passionate about improving health and well-being by translating proven public health programs into practice. She focuses on building capacity in community-based organizations that can reach underserved communities where they live, work, pray and play; her current work at the UW Health Promotion Research Center engages social service organizations to address late-life depression through home-based collaborative care (PEARLS). Since 2016, Lesley has worked with UW and Cambodian partners to strengthen NCD management and integrate depression into NCD care. Lesley is grateful for GO-HEALTH’s support of several global health / implementation science projects this summer to contribute to closing the mental health treatment gap in Cambodia.

Kristin Trivelli, PhD candidate, Nursing Practice | Zimbabwe
Project: Working with Healthcare Workers to Educate Post-partum Mothers about Breastfeeding

Kristen is a first year Doctorate of Nursing Practice and Department of Global Health WACh Certificate student, studying to be a Family Nurse Practitioner. Kristen earned her Bachelor of Science in Nursing, cum laude, from Georgetown University. She has volunteered with Operation Smile in India, and worked as a Critical Care Registered Nurse in California. Currently, Kristen is on the Core Leadership team for the UW Health Equity Circle. Through the support of the Go Health Fellowship, Kristen will conduct a qualitative study exploring the breastfeeding education healthcare workers provide to post-partum mothers in Well-Baby Outreach Clinics in rural Zimbabwe. Kristen’s global health goals include maximizing the role of nurses and advanced practice nurses worldwide, to their full practice potential, in order to alleviate global health disparities. The Go Health Fellowship will give Kristen the skills and experience necessary to eventually achieve her goals. 

Meredith Wang, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health; MPA candidate, Evans School​ | Kenya
Project: Developing Community-based Interventions Based on Needs Assessment 

Meredith Wang is a concurrent student pursuing a Master of Public Administration at Evans School and a Master of Public Health degree in global health program at UW. Her career interest is in data-driven analysis and decision-making in health system strengthening and reproductive health. Meredith is a now a research assistant at Global WACh center and Seattle Children’s Hospital working on adolescent HIV care and implementation of pediatric intervention in Peru. Before coming to the US, Meredith did undergrad at Zhejiang University in China and earned a Bachelor’s in management with a major in labor economics and econometrics. This fellowship will support Meredith to serve the Maasai community at Merrueshi clinics in Kenya and develop community-based interventions based off the needs assessment from previous year. She is interested in innovative and effective public health interventions to meet people where they are and build sustainable health intervention for future work. She strives to learn, absorb and contribute for the Maasai community. 

Valentine Wanga, PhD student, Department of Epidemiology | Switzerland
Project: Understanding the Role that UNAIDS Plays in Improving HIV Outcomes  

Valentine is a second year Epidemiology PhD student. Her goal is combine her quantitative skills with translation of research findings into public health impact. As an intern at the UNAIDS, Valentine will provide support to the Executive Office in developing and implementing plans for official visits, World Health Assembly events, bilateral meetings, the UNAIDS Programme Coordinating Board meeting and the International AIDS conference in Amsterdam. She will also provide support in preparing the 2018 UNAIDS Global AIDS Report. Valentine hopes to use the internship opportunity to learn about the high-level impact of the UNAIDS and understand the role that the UNAIDS plays in improving HIV outcomes globally. She will also use the opportunity to network with key individuals who are working in her area of interest (PrEP in young women), and to develop leadership skills for her future career work.

 

STRENGTHENING CARE OPPORTUNITIES THROUGH PARTNERSHIP IN ETHIOPIA (SCOPE) FELLOWSHIP

Roshan Katri, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Ethiopia
Project: Working with Under-served Populations

I am currently a global health graduate student at the University of Washington under the Fulbright exchange program from Nepal. I believe the SCOPE fellowship will give a new facet to my interest for working with undermined people at different resource deprived situations. I was stationed as a primary physician and medical superintendent of a district hospital, Jiri Hospital in rural Nepal for more than 3 years before leaving for my study. A major part of my clinical responsibility was related to health care of pregnant women and children varying from routine antenatal care, surgical intervention till postnatal care and national vaccination programs. Besides, I am also a medical volunteer for a non-profit called Headwaters Relief, with whom I have participated in medical campaigns during the European refugee crisis for Afghan and Syrian refugees and have volunteered in medical reliefs after disasters Puerto Rico and constantly work for orphanages in Haiti. My plan after the study is to continue my clinical work at various resource limited settings but with a better understanding of global perspective of health.

Rebekah Maldonado-Nofziger, Doctor of Nursing Practice in Community Health Nursing scholar | Ethiopia
Project: Health disparities in maternal child health

Rebekah Maldonado-Nofziger is a Doctor of Nursing Practice in Community Health Nursing scholar. She previously attended Eastern Mennonite University and graduated with a bachelors of science in nursing (BSN) degree. She comes from a multicultural background and very much values learning from people's various life upbringings, cultures, and traditions. Her job opportunities have involved working with folks who have experienced homelessness, working with a nonprofit agency to provide reduced medical specialty care, working as a school nurse, and most recently working as public health nurse for child care centers and preschools. Rebekah has had international experiences in various capacities. In undergraduate school, she worked as a student nurse in a child care center in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. She also spent time in the Middle East and Africa, including Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, and Israel. During that time she learned about various cultures, languages, and political contexts. While in Palestine, one of Rebekah's  projects involved understanding the community efforts of Beit Sahour, that used nonviolence resistance to address the oppression and violence their community was experiencing. With her background and experiences, she looks forward to partnering with health professionals, students, and the faith communities in Gondar, Ethiopia to address health disparities in maternal child health.

 

STERGACHIS ENDOWED FELLOWSHIP FOR INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE

Sabra Zaraa, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health; PhD student, Pharmacy | Saudi Arabia
Project: Assessment of Medication Utilization and Cost of Pilgrims During Hajj  

Sabra Zaraa, PharmD, is a Fulbright grantee from Tunisia, currently enrolled in her second year of MPH in Global Health Leadership, Policy and Management at University of Washington and will be starting her PhD in Pharmaceutical Outcomes Research and Policy at The Comparative Health Outcomes, Policy and Economics (CHOICE) Institute at UW, in the 2018 Fall. This Fellowship will allow Dr. Zaraa to conduct her study “Assessment of Medication Utilization and Cost of Pilgrims During Hajj 1439” in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Information about a population’s use of medicines is important for understanding and strengthening the supply chain for medicines and for public health planning purposes. To date, no studies have been reported on the use of medicines and their cost for pilgrims fulfilling the Hajj, the largest annual mass gathering in the world.

 

THOMAS FRANCIS, JR. GLOBAL HEALTH FELLOWSHIP

Frances Aunon, PhD candidate, Clinical Psychology | Kenya
Project: Assessing Network Changes Following ART Initiation Among HIV-positive Female Sex Workers

Frances Aunon is currently a fourth-year doctoral candidate in clinical psychology. After receiving her bachelors in global health and cultural anthropology from Duke University, she worked at the Duke Global Health Institute and RAND Corporation where she pursued HIV preventions and mental health treatment interventions primarily in sub-Saharan Africa. Her dissertation research uses egocentric network analysis to better understand potential mechanisms through which social support and stigma influence ART adherence and viral suppression in Mombasa, Kenya. The Thomas Francis, Jr. Fellowship will enable Frances to travel to Kenya to collect data to support her dissertation research in collaboration with the Women’s Health Project. Through the fellowship, she will collect longitudinal egocentric network data to assess how networks change following ART initiation among HIV-positive female sex workers. Frances will also have a unique opportunity to be mentored by a team of research clinicians who will provide valuable training for her global mental health research career.

Gao Zhaixing, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Nepal
Project: Measuring the Performance of Dhulikhel Hospital Outreach

Zhaixing is a master student in the Department of Global Health. She is from Wuhan University in China, selected as part of the China Medical Board (CMB) program. During her internship in China National Health Development Research Center (2017), she has participated in some projects about China’s foreign health assistance. Now, she is doing a qualitative study to evaluate the CMB program in UW. As a Chinese student, Zhaixing has few chances to go to a low-income country (LIC). With the Thomas Francis Jr. Fellowship, she plans to work with the Dhulikhel Hospital (DH) and link with the Nepal Ministry of Health to develop an assessment project to measure performance of DH outreaches in the context the MOH network of facilities. This project will provide her with much needed experience in a LIC and a chance to observe how a health care system works in LIC.

Jiang Wenwen, PhD student, Department of Epidemiology | Kenya
Project: Data Correction of SMS-based HIV Intervention to Improve ARV Adherence

Jiang Wenwen is a first-year PhD student in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Washington. She received a BS in Biological Sciences from Nanjing University and an MPH in Epidemiology concentrated in Hospital and Molecular Epidemiology with a certificate of Healthcare Infection Prevention and Control from the University of Michigan. Wenwen is very interested and passionate in HIV healthcare services of prevention and treatment, with a focus on marginalized populations and resource-limited areas.Through this fellowship in Kenya, she will be helping with data correction on records abstracted from a randomized clinical trial of an SMS-based HIV intervention on improving ARV adherence among HIV-infected pregnant women. She also looks forward to learning more about the science of designing, implementation and evaluation of HIV control strategies.

Christopher Kemp, PhD student, Department of Global Health | South Africa
Project: Integrated Primary Mental Healthcare in Rural South Africa

Christopher Kemp is a third-year PhD student in the Department of Global Health implementation science program. Christopher grew up in Seattle. Prior to joining the PhD program in 2015, he served with the Peace Corps in South Africa, living and working in rural KwaZulu-Natal on projects related to community-based HIV prevention and psychosocial support. He has been involved in a range of program implementation and health services research at the VA, PATH, I-TECH, UNICEF, and the Department of Global Health. He is passionate about health systems strengthening and the provision of mental health services in low-resource settings. Christopher will use the Thomas Francis travel award to conduct primary data collection for his dissertation research. He is part of a team evaluating the scale-up of an integrated primary mental healthcare model in rural South Africa, and will spend two months in KwaZulu-Natal conducting interviews and micro-costing in support of that evaluation.

Kate Lange, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Lesotho
Project: Analyzing the Success of the PrEP Intitiative 

Kate is a master’s student in the Department of Global Health. She earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls in International Studies and Political Science. Upon completing her degree, she used the skills she learned to better serve her time as a Peace Corps Volunteer on the island nation of Tonga. Following her Peace Corps service, Kate moved to Washington and began working for UW Neighborhood Clinics where she served as a communications link between patients and their doctors. During the summer, Kate will be collaborating with international organization, Jhpiego, on their initiative to roll out PrEP to 22,000 new at-risk individuals. Kate will work with the M&E team to analyze the success of the initiative and look for common factors among patients who drop out of care. Kate is very appreciative to have received the Thomas Francis Jr Global Health Fellowship and is very excited about the opportunity this provides her.

Abby Link, PhD student, School of Nursing | Zimbabwe
Project: Time and Motion Evaluation of Patients in HIV Clinics

Abby Link is a first-year PhD student in the School of Nursing at the University of Washington as a Robert Wood Johnson Nursing Scholar.  She holds a MPH with a concentration in international health and recently returned from working in Uganda, teaching nursing courses for students pursing their Bachelor’s degree in Midwifery. The experience with her students inspired her to pursue a PhD, to be able to teach the next generation of nurses both domestically and abroad. Through the generous support of the Thomas Francis Jr Global Health Fellowship, she will be collaborating with staff from Zimbabwe University by visiting private and public HIV clinics to perform a time and motion evaluation, which tracks and measures time and observes how patients flow through the different clinic services areas during their time at the clinic.  Additionally, patient satisfaction surveys from the clinic patients will be analyzed.  She hopes the findings from the evaluation will provide clinical leadership information on areas in which they can improve services to increase patient-centered care and increase satisfaction among their patients.

Juan Luo, PhD student, Department of Anthropology | China and Myanmar
Project: Investigating NGO Practices Between Groups

Juan Luo is a current PhD student in Sociocultural Anthropology at Department of Anthropology. Juan earned her equivalent Master degree in Anthropology (2008) and Bachelor degree in Ethnology and Economics (2005) from Minzu University of China. She also has a Certificate in Epidemiology and Global Health from University of Dundee (2010). Before coming to University of Washington, Juan has worked for four years in Health Poverty Action (formerly known as Health Unlimited), a British non-governmental organization delivering primary health care services at China and Myanmar border. With support of Global Health Fellowship, Juan will conduct her preliminary research on health NGOs' practice in particular HPA at China and Myanmar border. She will investigate how dynamic and complex NGO practice developed in an area where ethnic minority groups, NGOs, the Chinese government and the Myanmar government form a four-sided relationship that shaped and shifted NGO strategies over the past twenty years.

Katarina Ost, MPH candidate, Department of Health Services | Uganda 
Project: Analyzing the Relationship Between Weather Variability and Malaria

Katarina is a Master’s student in the health services department. After graduating from the University of Washington as an undergrad she spent a year working in behavioral health, after which she was accepted into the Public Health Associate Program with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Since then she has been working for Seattle Children’s Hospital as a Clinical Research Associate with the infectious disease team. Both of these experiences contributed to Katarina’s interest in working in infectious disease and global health research and she hopes that the Thomas Francis Jr. Fellowship will help her strengthen her research skills by allowing her to work with two leaders in the field of climate change and infectious disease. This fellowship will help fund a two month internship with the Priestly Center for Climate at the University of Leeds, where she will study the relationship between weather variability and malaria in Uganda.

Hugo Puerto, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health; PhD candidate, Department of Anthropology | Colombia 
Project: Exploring Barriers and Facilitators to Implementing an Indigenous Health System

Hugo is from Bogota, Colombia. His experience in global health started as an immigrant in the U.S. navigating the health system to get affordable health care access. While in school, Hugo traveled to different countries in Latin America and observed the inequity of healthcare access, particularly among low-income communities. These firsthand experiences led him to pursue a career in medical anthropology and global health exploring barriers and facilitators to accessing healthcare. Currently, Hugo is in the concurrent MPH in Global Health and Ph.D. in Anthropology program at UW, learning from world-class global health practitioners. Hugo’s pre-dissertation research explores barriers and facilitators to implementing an indigenous health system, by indigenous people, in search for culturally sensitive health care access in Colombia. The Thomas Francis Jr. Fellowship will allow Hugo to conduct his pre-dissertation work in Colombia to further develop connections with key stakeholders to finalize a community-based research design. 

Mahika Rangnekar, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health; MPA student, Evans School | Peru
Project: Evaluating Incentive Programs for Community Health Workers

Mahika Rangnekar is a Global Health MPH and Evans School MPA student interested in health systems strengthening through policy development. As an undergraduate, Mahika studied Social Welfare and Spanish Literature, with a focus on health education among Spanish-speaking immigrant communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. Prior to graduate school, she worked for the Department of Social Services in Marin County, California, where she administered public assistance benefits like Medicaid and food stamps. This summer, with the help of the Thomas Francis Jr. Global Health Fellowship, she is excited for the opportunity to travel to Peru and work with a non-profit organization that promotes health in under served rural communities in the Sacred Valley. Specifically, Mahika will be evaluating incentive programs for community health workers, to determine what factors motivate them to join the program, remain in the program, and perform in such a way that helps improve health outcomes.

​Zhao Yingxi, MPH candidate, Department of Global Health | Myanmar
Project: Analyzing Factors of Job Satisfaction and Retention of Health Workforce in Post-conflict Area

Zhao Yingxi is a MPH candidate at Department of Global Health, with a research interest on development assistance for health. He also has interest in Myanmar where he has worked in Yangon and bordering areas researching health system strengthening in ethnic regions. As a public health advocate, Yingxi has led student groups in public health advocacy and youth engagement in global development, and has participated as youth speaker in several WHO conferences where he shared experiences of youth-driven advocacy in China. Yingxi graduated from Peking University, China with a Bachelor Degree of Science. With the Thomas Francis Jr. Fellowship, Yingxi is planning to go back to Northeastern Myanmar and analyze factors related to job satisfaction and retention of health workforce in the post-conflict area. The findings will help ethnic health organizations and international donors to strengthen the health workforce and lay a solid foundation for achieving universal health coverage.

Zhibing Zhou (Cara), UW medical student I Nepal
Project: Improving rural schools' health curriculum on hygiene and nutrition

Zhibing Zhou (Cara) is a first-year UW medical student in Bozeman, MT. Cara immigrated to the United States from southern China in 2011. Inspired by her international experiences and the virtue of medicine that transcends borders and connects diverse cultures, Cara is driven toward participating in global health as a medical student now and as a physician in the future. Thanks to the generous support from the DGH and the Thomas Francis Jr. Fellowship, Cara will leave for Dhulikhel, Nepal this summer to carry out her 8-week Global Health Immersion Program (GHIP) project—quality improvement for a rural, school-health curriculum on hygiene and nutrition. This project will be a tremendous opportunity for Cara to practice skill sets for global health: learning about the Nepalese culture, getting to know community members, assessing the strength/weakness of the rural, school-health curriculum, and improving the curriculum in ways that suits her new community.