Posted on February 03, 2015
Source: Eric Yau
Before a recent testing event, I kept running through what we learned during HIV and HCV training. I prepared myself for emotional or even confrontational people. What would I say to reassure someone getting his or her hepatitis C test? It wasn’t long before a runner ushered in my first client who I greeted with a smile and a knot in my stomach – I was going to help him figure out his hepatitis C status. A couple hours later, the nervousness faded and I didn’t want to leave. I loved chatting with clients and easing them into their hepatitis C testing. The people I talked to were different from what I imagined; I learned that many of them knew a lot about hepatitis C or were eager to learn more. It felt rewarding to not only alleviate their fears about hepatitis C but also reassure them that the some things they had heard were just myths.
This partially embodies why I wanted to get involved with Generation Tomorrow. As an undergraduate with a Public Health major and now a Master’s student at the Bloomberg School of Public Health, I learned about the barriers to care faced by many people in Baltimore. I wanted to do what I could to help. I wanted to show people that there were many resources available to help them get and stay healthy.
I am now working with STAR TRACK (http://www.startrackbaltimore.org). STAR TRACK is a University of Maryland organization that aims to improve the health of underserved youth in Baltimore. I hope the work my colleague and I do in implementing hepatitis C testing and improving STAR TRACK’s online presence will help alleviate the healthcare barriers this population faces.
