Beginnings in Chinese Medicine
The New England School of Acupuncture & Clinica Familia Mir – Studying Chinese herbal medicine taught me that medicine is created from the ground up, from plants and forests and fields, and deepened my perception of how humans are integral beings and part of the surrounding environment and its history. This experience grounds my focus in public health through a “nourishing life” (養生) lens.  For more on Yang Sheng, or "nourishing life", click here.

I had the opportunity for a clinical rotation in the Dominican Republic, where I was part of a pilot project using acupuncture to address the health needs of Haitian migrant workers and stateless persons living with HIV and working in nearby sugarcane fields. There, I encountered Paul Farmer’s work in neighbouring Haïti, which introduced me to medical anthropology and global health governance. His focus on medical anthropology and social justice quickly melded with my prior background in theology. For more on the place of social justice in my vision, click here.

Oxford Medical Anthropology
& Early Consulting Projects
Oxford – Oxford introduced me to the methods of medical anthropology and the range of topics it addresses, with a focus on the interaction of biology and culture, the importance of social relations in understanding the symbols of health, and the historical and policy pathways that give rise to sickness.  

I wrote my thesis on extreme longevity among men in Sardinia (one of the "Blue Zones"). The thesis allowed me to begin a shift from thinking in terms of structures of illness and towards creating structures of health, measured by healthy extreme longevity (following the criteria used in Classical Chinese medicine about what constitutes ‘the best’ medicine). 

Local work in San Francisco
Alliance Health Project (AHP) – I was encouraged by someone in the SF DPH to become an HIV test counsellor, which I did before and during the rollout of both PrEP and the WHO U=U campaign. During counselling, I recognised many people had questions about what the term ‘undetectable’ meant with reference to HIV viral loads. I ran a small survey that identified geographical hotspots of misinformation, no information, and informed knowledge about the meaning of this term.

Connect for Care (C4C) Study – I worked on a text-message intervention trial based out of Ward 86 (the first HIV clinic in the United States) for viremic individuals in San Francisco. Many were housing and food insecure, were intravenous drug-users (IDUs), or unhoused. This work introduced me to the range of HIV-oriented social services in SF and their political history – an early foray in the Political Determinants of Health (PDoH). Interviewing IDU participants in the trial, I also noticed some equated the phenomenon of drug tolerance (e.g. to heroin) with drug resistance (i.e. to ART), leading them to periodically stop taking ART so that their body would not develop a tolerance or "resistance" to the medication.

AIDS Legal Referral Panel (ALRP) – Pursuing the idea of working on political determinants of health, I volunteered as an Immigration Law Clerk at the AIDS Legal Referral Panel. After meeting with a social worker, we realised that attorneys, social workers, and clients were often cross-communicating (or not communicating at all). I designed a project, “Getting to Zero through Immigration Reform”, to coordinate attorneys, social workers, and their clients around expectations, timelines, and their respective needs. 

Policy-oriented projects
Policy-oriented work – Through a project based out of the California DPH offices, I helped organize a meeting of public health officials and health campaign advertising industry professionals to discuss messaging frames for HIV and STI prevention. I noted that politicians were a key (overlooked) demographic for public health messaging. Through this position, I also participated in a Policy Academy run by the National Coalition of STI Directors, with a focus on HPV vaccination for adult MSM. This culminated in lobby visits on Capitol Hill (Feinstein, Harris, Pelosi), which I had enjoyed but hadn’t had the chance to do since my undergraduate years in New York State.

Photojournalism – Meeting with social advertisers led me to think about the imagery we use in public health, and I enrolled in a photojournalism course at CCSF. My projects all focused on the health angle for each week’s project (portraits, features, politics, sports, spot news, photo stories). For more about my interest in public health photojournalism, click here.

ANCHOR & the Pandemic
ANCHOR – As a Senior Clinical Research Coordinator (National Recruitment Coordinator) for the Anal Cancer HSIL Outcomes Research study, I had the pleasure of working with the study’s pre-existing design partners, Kanopi Studios, to reorganise the study’s website and make it more accessible to the needs of both participants, community advisory board members, and clinic coordinators. I worked with Kanopi on copy for the informational palm cards that we used as both recruitment and post-study health literacy instruments for providers, men, women, and transfolks. This was also my introduction to working closely with local and national Community Advisory Board (CAB) members whose advice and support were crucial to the study's success.

​Pandemic – During work at ANCHOR, I noted resistance and questions from some people about participating in research studies. I and a colleague developed palm cards and an associated presentation to teach people about the ethics currently undergirding US-based research studies, and the questions they can ask research trial coordinators. 

The initial intention was to benefit recruitment to our own study and smooth the way for others doing their own study recruitment in the same geographical areas. This effort began right before the start of the pandemic, and we later handed the product messaging over to LADPH and a team at UCLA for their use.

The SEARCH Consortium
The Sustainable East Africa Research in Community Health (SEARCH) consortium of studies has given me the opportunity to flourish as an analyst, writer, and mentor. I’ve been able to work with global teams on topics as varied as HIV (the main focus), TB prevention, hypertension telehealth treatment, optimising CHW roles, and global health ethics via reciprocal partnerships.

Among my main publication arcs are the following:
  • IPT: geography, decentralisation, five key lessons.
  • Youth: stigma, disclosure, engagement in care
  • Sero: adapting socio-ecological model, narratives, needs
  • HTN: main, subjectivity, community negotiations
  • For an annotated bibliography of my first- and second-author publications, click here.

Perhaps one of my favourite responsibilities has been mentoring team members in writing and publication, with presentations on thick description, tracking literature reviews, and ethical thinking (meta-ethics).