Field notes from the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control 2019 pilot internship program for resident doctors

Abstract

The 10-week internship for the pilot cohort of resident doctors from various teaching hospitals in Nigeria was a very rewarding experience. The internship was a beautiful immersion into field epidemiology, rumor surveillance, risk communication, digital tools for surveillance, developing strategic documents, line lists interpretation, weekly presentations and outbreak response coordination alongside working briefly as an incident manager for the Yellow Fever technical working group. Some of the learning points included: meeting coordination, contributions to ongoing research, review of training documents for surveillance officers and the mechanisms of escalating and de-escalating technical working groups in the face of outbreaks and working as an incident manager. There is the need to continue this internship to strengthen the capacity of our emerging health workforce in residency training to address our public health priorities in Nigeria.