My practicum site was Smiles of Hyattsville/North Bethesda, which is a local dentists office with locations in Prince George's and Montgomery County. They were looking to develop a business communication platform similar to Slack that would be tailored to the needs of dental workers. For example, there would be additional features where dentists could communicate directly with insurance providers, their own patients, view intraoral scans, and send requests for supplies. I worked on the scan display feature. I found this opportunity by visiting the Careers4Terps website. I am a Computer Science major, so I used the site to search for software engineering internships and found that Smiles had posted an opening for interns. I sent them my resume and a short letter of interest and they accepted me to the position. For future SGC Scholars, I think Careers4Terps is a great resource for finding an internship for your practicum. Not only do you have something to do for your practicum, but you get valuable experience working in your future career field and developing professionally. Another good option is to take one of the approved classes; I know many Scholars that did that and found it to be an interesting learning experience.
My experience working for Smiles was virtual, so my supervisor, colleagues, and I met over Google Meetings. My task was to develop the imaging portion of the application. In dentistry, each adult tooth is assigned a number and dental imaging apps display X-rays of the teeth in order of their numbers. The file locations of the patient scans were stored in a MySQL database alongside the corresponding numbers of the teeth present in the scan. Using SQL queries and Java Swing, I extracted this information from the databse and created a user interface where images were placed at certain coordinates on the window based on their numbers. I also attended weekly virtual check-ins where I updated my supervisor and co-workers on my progress with the application.
During my time at Smiles I learned a lot of new programming techniques and technologies as well as a little bit about dentistry! I had never used the SQL language nor had I ever designed a user interface with Java (though I had a lot of experience coding in Java before). I basically started from scratch with these topics and was proud to have learned them well enough to create a functional app for the office. I also learned about the numbering system in dentistry and I learned about the inner workings of intraoral scanners. Additionally, I got to experience firsthand how science -specifically computer science- is present in so many aspects of our lives. Although I had watched dentists use the type of imaging application I had designed and had received intraoral scans of my own, I had never given much thought to the fact that a software engineer like me had to plan, design, and develop that app. I had certainly never given much thought to how difficult that process can be, both intellectually and creatively. I gained a lot of appreciation for how advanced the field has become and how much our lifestyles have improved thanks to computers. I would say that this internship experience has cleared up my plans for the future. It gave me a glimpse of the intersection between computer science and healthcare, and I have since realized that I want to explore this intersection more. I have always known that I want to use my coding skills to help people and improve their lives, and I believe that helping develop new healthcare technologies is the best way to achieve this.