Hello!
Hi! We figured we should introduce ourselves before we leave for Tanzania so here goes!
I'm Jenna Racine, a soon-to-be junior majoring in Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development. After completing my undergraduate degree, I am planning on going to medical school to specialize in cardiology. I currently am employed at the U of M Medical Center in the Neuropsychology Department as a secretary/transcriptionist. It's the best job ever and I'm not just saying that because I gave all my coworkers the link to this! ;)
While I'm not studying or working, I really enjoy running, driving, doing crossword puzzles, and watching old M*A*S*H re-runs. (At this point in my life, my only claim to fame is the fact that I've seen all but one episode!) After I retire I hope to continue practicing medicine in a MASH-like setting or third world country. I know it's just television, but I think the show is just amazing!
I'm so happy I decided to go travel to Tanzania with Biology Without Borders and our departure can't come soon enough! It is going to be such an amazing experience, an experience I think all people planning on venturing into the medical profession should pursue. I'm also very excited for all of our projects- we're going to be so busy! To give a brief overview of what we plan on doing, we have two major projects, both related to diabetes awareness/prevention. The first is what we call "The Beads Project." We hope to begin a sustainable project for the Bukoba Disabled Assistance Project (BUDAP) where we will teach the 20-30 people who live there to make these beaded keychains and bracelets using hemp and blue beads that are meant to signify the international diabetes symbol (a blue circle). We will then attach a piece of cardstock with five ways to prevent diabetes in both English and Swahili (their native language), bring them back to the US, and sell them at local businesses with all of the profits going back to BUDAP. The second, larger project involves collecting the demographic information of diabetic patients from hospitals in the Bukoba area and bringing it back to the US to analyze. Surprisingly, as far as we know, there aren't any projects of this sort currently running in Tanzania so we're pretty excited about it! We hope to continue both of these projects for many years and return to Bukoba every summer. Along with the two projects, we are volunteering/shadowing at the Kagera Regional Hospital and helping to rebuild orphanages in the area.
Well, that's all for now! Talk to you in TZ!! :)