Military Research and Government Research

While completing my masters in public health (MPG) in epidemiology and biostatistics, I was working in clinical research for pharmaceutical companies in HIV and women’s health. 

I decided to apply for government contracting/consulting jobs in 2008-09. I leveraged my data analysis skills from my MPH program and landed a job as a public health/business analyst with the Health and Human Services, Indian Health Service (IHS) where I worked with Dr. Theresa Cullen on disease surveillance and population health, and wrote an article which was published with MedInfo Journal. 

I was then exposed to the software development lifecycle where I was writing test cases and test plans for RPMS- Resource and Patient Management System. I learned on the job about information technology and asked a lot of questions about the software development lifecycle. I was introduced to coworkers who performed requirements writing, testing and writing requirements documentation. The contract position ended after 5 months but that was the start of my career in government and consulting. 

I then applied to a job at Deloitte in health information technology and got a job in 2010 as a data analyst for the Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery (BUMED) and after that project ended, I was networking within Deloitte and found a position as a business analyst at the Military Health Service (supports TriCare and for the Department of Defense – DoD and all the military hospitals, etc) where I was trained on the job about the requirements writing portion of the software development lifecycle in more detail than before. I stayed with that project for almost three years. That is essentially how I transitioned from clinical sciences to business analysis- health information technology. I still remain in the healthcare field, but rather on the IT side. 

My client was the Federal Government, and honestly, it’s matter of need when it comes to assisting scientists. If the DoD – Army needs scientists or any other entity of the DoD then I recommend scientists to apply and always be on the lookout for opportunities to learn more on the job. It is vital in government contracting and consulting to network and maintain relationships. I would recommend taking a risk (leap of faith) and trying other jobs in different fields than strict science, research and analysis.