Internship Alum Interviews: Amanda Cheney Zitting

Dec 13

This post is part of a series of interviews with past interns about how Concussion Alliance impacted their lives going forward. This interview follows up with Amanda Cheney Zitting, who was a 2022 graduate of Brigham Young University. She is currently working for the University of Utah doing health research with joint employment at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. To learn more, see Amanda Cheney Zitting’s profile page. This interview was conducted by Ella Gullickson, a sophomore history major at Carleton College, as part of her December 2023 interview. See Ella’s profile.

Ella Gullickson:

Hi, I'm Ella. I am here interviewing Amanda, who has done the Concussion Alliance internship in the past. Amanda, would you please introduce yourself a little bit?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yes, gladly. I am Amanda, she/her pronouns, and I have a background in public health. I studied public health at Brigham Young University, and I have an emphasis in health promotion. I graduated in 2022, about a year ago, and ever since then, I've been working for the University of Utah doing health research with a joint employment at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, focusing mostly on brain injuries of veterans and the outcomes that they have throughout the life course.

Ella Gullickson:

That all sounds really fascinating. I wish Carleton had a public health major, which is where I am.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yeah, awesome.

Ella Gullickson:

My first question is, when did you start working with Concussion Alliance, and what drew you in?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I started working with Concussion Alliance in June 2022. I had been looking for an internship that had to do with Brain Health and just looking through the different organizations that offered internships, and I came across their page and reached out to Connor, and that's how it all came to be.

I also had a long history of concussion and post-concussion syndrome, so it was something that I was really passionate about just from my own personal experience and knowing how much that can affect people. That drew me in, and I wanted to work with a nonprofit so that just solidified why I wanted to choose them over any other organization.

Ella Gullickson:

That sounds very similar to what drew me in. I also have dealt with some post-concussive symptoms, and I also wanted to learn more and learn more about my brain health as well as how I can help other people, so that's really cool that we have that connection. What were some highlights of your Concussion Alliance internship?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I think for me, the highlights were gaining a better knowledge and feeling more confident in my skill set, as well as my knowledge around concussion and mental health and stuff like that, specifically from the guest speakers, as well as creating my own project with my partner, I thought that was really fun. After the internship, I felt that I had a better grasp on the topic and could speak to it a lot better than before, even after years of doctor's appointments around it.

Ella Gullickson:

Were there any particular guest speakers that were particularly impactful for you?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Good question. Eve Valera. She talked about domestic violence as something that we don't study as often within MTBI or concussion. I think that was just...

It wasn't really something I had thought of before, especially when she talked about asphyxiation causing brain injuries and having very similar symptoms to concussion, and then that making it maybe harder for them to understand why they needed to leave or make it harder to leave in general. I think that just as an interest that I have of women's health was just really cool because it put it into a completely different perspective.

Ella Gullickson:

Can you talk a little bit about your project during the internship?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yeah, my project with my partner focused on the difference between women's and girls outcomes of concussion versus males. There was already a page that existed, and so we were updating that, but since it was something I was really, really passionate about and had experience with, I wanted to make sure it was really comprehensive and was somewhere that people could go to when they were having these issues and be like “this makes sense”. This is why I'm having these things happen.

Especially when you do Google searches and stuff like that, there's still not a lot that comes up on the topic, so we really want to make sure that it is very cohesive and comprehensive. We tried to focus a lot on pretty much anything that could come up on the topic, whether that's caregiving as a wife of someone who's had a concussion, or a mother, or participating in sports as a girl, or veteran service as a woman, or just getting them in general from domestic violence or anything else.

We had a great time diving into all those different topics, and it turned out really well; we're very proud of that page. It helped us to have a good background on the topic as well.

Ella Gullickson:

Yeah, I've taken a look at it, and it's really impressive, all the different populations that you added in there, I can't even imagine how you put all that stuff into one page, but you did it. It doesn't sound incomplete at all. It's all there.

How did your project about the population of women and girls influence future research, like what you're doing with the veteran concussion recovery?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Like I said, I already had a passion for concussions in general as well as women's health. I had been part of the Women's Health Organization in their leadership while I was an undergrad, and so I used that to find a job. I literally just networked everywhere until I found this job. That was one of the first projects that they were working on that had to do with concussions and the different outcomes between men and women, specifically with depression rates.

That was a paper that I had assisted on a little bit when I first started. That's the main project that we've done specifically with women's health, but we also just did another paper with women veterans as caregivers, so they do their service. They may have their own brain injuries, but then they go on to care for their children or maybe a disabled spouse or just caregiving as a job. We looked at the different health outcomes of that as well.

It was really interesting to see that they really do have poorer health than if you were just a civilian who was also a caregiver, and brain injury was one of the things that we attributed that to. Those are two projects that we've worked on that are specific to women's health and brain injuries.

Ella Gullickson:

Wow, that's fascinating. Is it attributed to them being overworked in comparison to civilian caregivers?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

There are a lot of different outcomes. It was things like they were more likely to already have chronic health issues or poor mental health and maybe different trauma, whether that's military sexual trauma or trauma from combat or whatever it was. There were just a lot of different things that an average woman civilian wouldn't have had to face already along with the brain injuries and stuff like that.

It was stuff like that, and then caregiving in general can be really hard on mental health, a really big burden, and sometimes you're not paid at all if it's for a family member. That can be really hard financially, and there's just a lot of different things that go into it.

Ella Gullickson:

Wow, that's really important research that you're doing. I'd never heard of any of that stuff. What made you want to return to Concussion Alliance as an expert speaker?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I think for me, obviously, Connor asked, but I think that just knowing that they are obviously a nonprofit and trying to get funding and they don't have funding for every little thing, so the more that I can do as someone who wants to further the work as a volunteer, the more I can help them and help further concussion research and education and advocacy around the topic. I think just knowing that it was something that they needed and I could do it pretty easily. That was it for me pretty, much.

Ella Gullickson:

I think it also really shows your interest in public health.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yeah, definitely. I love public health. You're right, I wish Carleton had a public health major because anybody I meet, I'm like public health is the best thing you can study. It's so comprehensive and covers so many different topics.

Ella Gullickson:

Yeah, it's fascinating. Again, I wish I could study public health. How, if at all, did the Concussion Alliance influence your plans for the future?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I think that for me, I was close to graduating when I did the internship. I only had a couple of months left when I did the internship at school, so I was already looking for a job that gave me the experience I needed to get a job within the field of brain health. I think it gave me what I needed to be ready for those and also be a good candidate, but I did already know that that was something I wanted to work in; it just solidified it for me.

Ella Gullickson:

I'm glad it helped you find jobs in research because the work is really important. Has Concussion Alliance connected you more with other interns or professionals since your internship program?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I don't think so, but I still have contact information for many speakers. I added them on LinkedIn and stuff during the internship, so I still have them on LinkedIn. I could use them as future connections. I know that Connor and Malayka are always good resources, so I don't doubt that I could get help or other connections if it were something that I needed.

Ella Gullickson:

Yeah, it's really powerful to have that networking even if you haven't used it yet. How did the internship help you more broadly?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I think in general it was great to have it be remote for me. I think that A, gave me more work experience, working a remote job, which made me a better candidate to get a remote job. Right now, my job, I only have to go in once a month or if there's something that I need to do in person. That was one thing that I really wanted because I do have a lot of health issues, and I do struggle with migraines still from the concussion and stuff.

I think that that is a very broad or more obscure thing, just having it be remote and getting more work experience that was remote. I think just being more confident in my skillset as well as being able to speak more to my experience in interviews and stuff like that.

Ella Gullickson:

Yeah, I've never worked in a remote workplace until now, and I never realized it was a skillset. I just never would've thought about it, but it really is, to stay motivated and show that you're able to keep up with things on your own.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Definitely.

Ella Gullickson:

Did what you learned about concussions through the internship impact your relationship with others?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I think that, yes. My family already had a pretty good understanding of concussions and the different treatments and stuff because I had tried 99% of it that they have on their website. But I think that as we talked about it more, I was talking about what I was learning and all that stuff, it helped them to connect to what I was doing in my work and what I do now.

There was a couple that came, Linda and Bob Dahl, and they talked about their son taking his own life after falling out of a window as a child and getting a brain injury. That was something that... It was a really great video, obviously, but also seeing that they were real people too. I think that those things I also shared with my family is where I was going with that. I was able to also impact other people in my life with the things that I was learning there.

Ella Gullickson:

That's interesting. Do you think your conversations with your family made them more understanding of what was going on?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yeah, I think so. I think that they acknowledged that research is still going on. There are a lot of different things that they didn't know about or whatever. I think that realizing that although maybe they see my situation as something hard, there are still a lot of other people who have gone through even worse on the topic. So yeah, I definitely think so.

Ella Gullickson:

Yeah, I'm happy that your family gained that understanding. I'm sure they already had an understanding, but you can always learn more, I think.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yep, definitely.

Ella Gullickson:

I just have one more question. How did your intern experience with Concussion Alliance change your perspective on your concussion experience, if at all?

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I think my biggest takeaway was how wrong some of my doctors were back when I was doing it just because this happened to me in 2014 or 2015, I can't remember, so there definitely was this research out there, but it's not as prevalent as it is today with things like returning to exercise and stuff like that where I was doing all the more of the cocooning thing where you're staying in a dark room.

For me, it was really interesting to look back at my own experience and be like, “Wow, I wonder if they had done it a little bit differently if I would've had a different outcome” or maybe it would've been the same. It was just really interesting to see. There were some things where I was given the wrong advice. Reflecting on my own experiences, I think that was my biggest takeaway.

Ella Gullickson:

I've also suffered a concussion, and I have post-concussive symptoms too. My first concussion was in 2016, when they also told me to cocoon and be in a dark room. I think it's really interesting how all of that advice has changed. With a later concussion that I had, the information that I got still wasn't completely accurate. A lot of times, they would attribute my post-concussive symptoms to anxiety or...

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Dismiss them and stuff.

Ella Gullickson:

Yeah, and I think it's really interesting because I was watching your showcase and I am in the population you discussed. I was in that population that you talked about before college age, where the recovery period is much longer because you got inadequate care. I definitely reflected and realized that that probably was my case, so I think it's really interesting.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I'm sorry to hear that.

Ella Gullickson:

You're trying to fix it with your interest and work in public health. I appreciate it. I think it's just really common.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

Yeah, I agree. I think it also goes to how much this needs to be taught more in med schools and continuing education for doctors. I know that Connor and Malayka have worked on that stuff a little bit, but I think that it's just one of those topics that doctors may think they know about and don't need to learn this new... Or maybe change what they were already doing or whatever, but I think the research is showing more and more that we really do need to make changes to protocols and how we react when people get concussions.

Ella Gullickson:

For sure. I had some doctors who referred me to the concussion clinic, and I had vestibular therapy, and I think that helped. I think that the knowledge behind concussion recovery is growing.

I also had a neurologist who said it might just be anxiety, and I left wanting more. I think it's interesting, the disparity in knowledge and what you said about how medical schools should teach it, and people who are already doctors, I think need to have a lot more education on it.

Amanda Cheney Zitting:

I agree—especially for people who have been in the medical field for a long time. Maybe there are doctors who are keeping up really well. I don't want to bash doctors because obviously we need them, and I'm grateful for them, but I think that a lot of times when people have been in the medical field for a long time, they maybe get set in their ways or set in what they know and don't expand that as much. Some do a really great job, like you said, when you get referred to a concussion clinic.

I think also one of the big themes in the page that we did was not gaslighting people or dismissing people because of their symptoms and just saying maybe it's your mental health, or maybe it's in your head, or you're just anxious and you're causing these symptoms or stuff like that is what also needs to end within the medical field.