Gina Nguyen

I am interested in two things in public health: reproductive health including sexually

transmitted diseases and environmental factors that facilitate healthy growth among children. My
interest in sexual diseases started when a professor shared a sensitive story concerning HIV and
sexual assault which had an emotional impact on me. Personally, I grew up in an environment
with little to no sex education which posed many potential risks to my health. Protecting
adolescents of all ages is something I am very passionate and I believe that everyone deserves to
grow up in livable conditions and have a proper sex education. My public health focus will be
geared towards sex and reproductive education for adolescents and mothers. In addition, I would
like to understand socioecological factors the help certain kids grow up to be healthy adults
compared to those who are not healthy in later life.
I took two courses during my first and second years of college that made me want to
study public health: microbiology and epidemiology. Microbiology became the foundation for
my interest in public health. We learned about the mechanisms of certain pathogenic bacteria and
the different toxins they produced. I got to explore this passion of mine during an environmental
health course in college. I studied a bacteria and disease of my choice, Clostridium botulinum,
which helped me further my understanding of how toxins can affect the body. When I was doing
my research for my project, I found stories on prisoners making and giving out prison wine or
“pruno” to each other, which left a few of them hospitalized. This made me appreciate the study
of epidemiology which is a subfield in the public health sector. Moreover, I learned that the
environment plays a huge role in one’s health outcomes. With models such as the Theory of
Planned Behavior (TPB), individuals are able to actively partake in preventive measures to
decrease the risk for disease and improve their own health outcomes. Some people need to be
encouraged to believe in themselves and quit unhealthy behaviors or start healthy ones. This area
of public health is important because it deals with people, their behaviors, and environment. On
the quantitative side of public health, I was able to perform basic data analyses such as ANOVA
and independent t-tests during a research class using SPSS software. Being able to understand
and interpret some data is valuable for my future in this field. I believe that having good health
includes mental and emotional harmony. Adolescents that grow up in neighborhoods that are
characterized by poverty or violence, are more likely to experience poor health outcomes
because of its stress on individuals.
Currently, I am working under the supervision of Dr. Zhiping Yu in order to gain some
research experience. It is important for me to understand the research process, including data
collection, running statistical analyses, and interpreting data for my future career. During my
internship, I plan on working with an organization where I get to improve my skills with SPSS or
other statistical software and gain more insight on how health programs are executed in a
community. Internships that provide me with experience on sexually transmitted diseases would
be advantageous for my future. In the near future, I plan on receiving my Master’s degree in
Public Health, Epidemiology so that I gain more leadership skills to serve the population.