Technological Contributions

I have been working on sorting data regarding symptoms of colorectal cancer patients. I am using excel to sort through the data while my counterpart is using R studio. This past week I was also in charge of doing some research and reading journals on the death rates of COVID-19 patients across the country. I found it very interesting because I was reading about the excess death-rates, which is essentially all deaths related to COVID-19. These are people that have died due to COVID-19 effects. This includes suicides, domestic violence, asthma related issues, not going to the hospital when they should have etc. I was in charge of leading a discussion for us interns about the research I found. Statisticians are able to record the number of deaths directly related to COVID-19, but they must also account for all of the deaths that are COVID-19 related, or illnesses that resulted from COVID-19 illness. I was most interested in leading a discussion about where to draw the line, or what illnesses/effects of COVID-19 count as a COVID-19 related death. There are many challenges because statisticians (epidemiologists) from hospitals worldwide should likely be on the same page about where they draw this distinction.

I have also been able to personally contribute to my team because I am the only one that has taken a statistics course based on R studio. It is difficult to learn how to code, so I am able to offer help where I can. I have also taken an excel course at Richmond so I am a bit more technologically advanced on the technological side since my peers have not yet been able to take an R or excel course. My team has been super helpful when I have questions as well. I really enjoy working with the other interns as well as Mithat. So far, it has been really great and I feel as though I have contributed the most I can.