Hannah Engelhart - Region 4

​Hi everyone! My name is Hannah Engelhart, and I am a region 4 Sodexo dietetic intern from Bergen County, NJ. Starting the internship, I had never worked in a hospital and was intimidated at the idea of working in a clinical environment. However, after 500+ hours in clinical (including my specialty), I can finally say not only do I feel confident, but knowledgeable in providing MNT to patients with varying health backgrounds. I am about 80% of my way done with the internship (seriously cannot believe it) and am finishing up my community rotation with a retail dietician. Before my community rotation, I wrapped up my final clinical hours during my specialty in oncology and could not have enjoyed the rotation more.
 
Throughout this experience I have learned many lessons, such as: how to critically think, trust my judgement and make quick decisions. Something that I have been appreciative as well through this experience is how supportive my internship directors and preceptors have been. A quick personal story is that I broke my wrist during my LTC rotation (6+ weeks with a cast) and was very discouraged, but having the support and overcoming a challenge I was not expecting was rewarding.
 
A great opportunity I have had during my community rotation is table events. Since being in clinical for 5 months I was not being as creative as I typically am, so being able to demo recipes that I developed the past two weeks has been a fun change of pace. Overall, the past 7+ months have been challenging, but so rewarding in being able to discover what parts of the field I am most connected to. I never thought oncology would be a rotation I enjoyed and want to pursue in the future, but I took a chance! The best advice I could give to any intern is to try everything, and take as many opportunities as you can, because you never know what you like until you try it! I am so excited to be eligible to sit for my exam in less than 2 months to become a licensed RDN and finish up my incredible internship at Sodexo. 

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