"The International PhD in Global Health, Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Medicine gave me an incredible opportunity to grow my research skills in a challenging field like disaster response. A number of major challenges exist for disaster research, starting from the highly adverse environmental conditions and stressful context, the difficulties to collect data, the need to not hinder the operational response, the attention to the ethical issues common to all research human subjects, but its contribute can change the outcomes for the affected populations and the healthcare providers. Combining my daily work with the PhD gave me the opportunity to carry out some important research projects during both the disaster and the recovery phases, with interesting results and exciting points of discussions. The knowledge acquired, the people I met and the competencies I developed during this PhD enriched me from a personal and professional point of view, helping me to be more efficient in my daily work on behalf of people in need."