Samuel Castro Email & Phone Number

Los Angeles, Ca, Us

Palo Alto, California, United States

Clinical Anatomy Teaching Assistant

Mozambique

Through my Fulbright independent research project, I hope to better understand the stigma surrounding individuals who seek and use HIV services in Nampula, Mozambique. Specifically, the project’s aim is to understand what factors influence pregnant women resulting in poor adherence to medication and failure to follow up after their initial diagnosis in order to provide better services to improve adherence and reduce vertical transmission. What are the major psychosocial stressors that mothers face during their pregnancy that may lead to higher vertical transmission rates? What is the baseline knowledge that husbands have between HIV and AIDS, modes of transmission, and antiretroviral therapy (ART)? What are the attitudes the local community has on health facilities, the services they provide and their role in the community? Are there any health practices from pregnant women that place them at greater risk of transmitting HIV to their child? These are the main questions I want my research to answer to help guide ICAP improve adherence in pregnant women and reduce vertical transmission.

Greater New York City Area

• Mediate communication between English speaking providers (MD, RN, PT, RD) and patients in a wide range of settings from the emergency department, in-patient rooms, and out-patient clinics.• Upheld interpreter code of ethics and standards of practice, cultural competency and mastered medical and colloquial terminology

Greater Los Angeles Area

Hospital Administration Summer Intern Health Career Connection• Conducted an Outpatient Surgery Center needs assessment to understand the pain points involved in the expansion of operations • Implemented a Root Cause Analysis to improve the process of line placement orders for CAR-T infusions for Hematology patients• Organized over 500 Press Ganey Patient Satisfaction Surveys to distribute to physicians across City of Hope for further improvement of services• Supported Lean Sigma Six workplace safety revitalization across 8 Operating Room sized Outpatient Surgery Center.

Greater New York City Area

• Communicated difficult coursework into easier understanding for over 50 students using various teaching methods• Managed weekly office hours, grading of examinations and homework assignments while assisting professors in various science classes

Greater New York City Area

• Investigate the delivery of E. Coli as possible delivery vehicles for cancer therapeutics in subcutaneous mouse models• Analyzed and engineered various genetic promoter using genetic cloning techniques to understand population dynamics in E. Coli

Nampula, Mozambique

Piloted an Early Infant Diagnosis case surveillance tracker that traced 390 infants across 19 health facilities to understand bottlenecks leading to high mother-to-child transmission rates of HIV and interpreted results from data analyses to inform future work

La Romana, Dominican Republic

• Designed, implemented and presented research study using convenience sampling of 300 patients to improve the HIV voluntary counseling and testing services offered in Clinica de Familia La Romana (CFLR)

Bachelor Of Science - Bs, Bioengineering And Biomedical Engineering

Activities and Societies: Dean's List, Camp Kesem, Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers- Internal Vice President, Captain Intramural.

Education record

Activities and Societies: Math and Science Club, National Honors Society

Doctor Of Medicine - Md