Category: Caroline

It’s hard to believe my practicum is already over! The past two months have gone by so quickly, and I felt mixed emotions leaving the hospital and the research team. While I felt happy about finishing my practicum, I felt sad to leave the wonderful people I’ve gotten to know this summer. Overall, my practicum was a very positive and formative experience that allowed me to learn and grow as a person and as a student. Getting a grasp on R programming, running statistical analyses, and writing a scientific article were all challenging in their own way, but I’m proud of what I accomplished throughout my practicum.

After completing our analyses, we found that consumption of growing up milk (a fortified milk given to children after breastfeeding cessation) in the second year of life was positively associated with a few neurodevelopmental outcomes, but the effect sizes were somewhat small. Contrary to our hypothesis, we did not observe an effect of socioeconomic status on this association. However, I still considered socioeconomic status when creating my evidence-based nutrition handouts for caretakers of young children. Growing up milk can be expensive, and since it isn’t necessary for adequate nutrition, my handouts emphasize iron-deficiency prevention, which includes feeding children iron-rich foods and being mindful of their dairy consumption.

Outside of my practicum, it’s been a very exciting time to be in Paris with the Olympics! Thanks to my amazing host family, I had the opportunity to go with them to a women’s soccer game at the Parc des Princes (the teams were Brazil and Japan). It was an unforgettable experience, and I feel incredibly lucky to have had the chance to attend an Olympic game in person. On the weekends, I’ve had a lot of fun exploring Paris with my host family and with some new friends I’ve met here. I also got out of the city one weekend to visit Brittany and enjoy some time at the beach. I’ll be sad to pack up and leave Paris soon, but I’m grateful for my life-changing experience here and look forward to coming back again sometime in the future.

 

 

 

-Caroline

06/30/2024

Bonjour from Paris! My name is Caroline Polito and I am an MPH candidate in the nutrition concentration. I just finished the second week of my practicum at the Centre of Research in Epidemiology and Statistics (CRESS), a department of Inserm, which is the French national institute of health and medical research. CRESS is in a university hospital located in Villejuif, which is south of Paris but not far by metro.

My first week was challenging, but I have already learned a lot. I arrived in France on June 15 and started my practicum on June 17, so I was dealing with jet lag while also adjusting to speaking French every day and learning to navigate the city. Suffice it to say, I was exhausted after the first week but am excited for what lies ahead. My practicum work is focused on a nutritional epidemiology topic, which includes a research and intervention design component. First, I am analyzing data from an observational cohort study to determine if there is an association between the consumption of growing up milk (a fortified milk given to children after breastfeeding cessation) in the second year of life and neurodevelopment. I am using R for the statistical analyses, which is new to me and quite different from Stata, but I’m getting the hang of it slowly but surely. After these analyses, I will develop an evidence-based nutrition flyer/handout for families with young children about how to prevent iron deficiency (since iron is a very important nutrient for neurodevelopment).

The research team at CRESS has been very kind and welcoming, and I’m grateful for their willingness to help when I’m stuck with R coding. Believe it or not, one of the doctoral students here is American and did her undergrad at UNC! It’s a small world, and I’m glad to have a fellow Tar Heel to talk to. I have had interesting conversations with members of the research team about public health/healthcare in France compared to the United States, and I look forward to learning more about public health in France during my practicum, as well as French culture and language. I am also excited to explore Paris and other parts of France on the weekends!

-Caroline