Week 5: Mello Yello

     This week was very mellow which allowed me to concentrate more on and nail down ideas for a project. I met with Dr. Vahdat after the Monday afternoon Research Meeting to go over possible project ideas. Her research is heavily in clinical trials and she has a team of about 10 people that help her and the other doctors in the office. I asked if maybe I could contribute to some data analysis but she could see the less than enthusiastic expression on my face. After asking me what I wanted to do, I told her of an idea I had about an improvement to the surgical marking pens I saw used in the DIEP flap from a couple weeks ago. She thought it was a great idea and I should head in that direction. She then showed me a picture of refractory chest wall disease after mastectomy and asked if I could solve this problem. I remembered meeting the Dr. Ching Tung just the week before and learned of a spray they were developing to detect tumors. I thought of combining this spray with some therapeutic targeting agent to specifically target the tumors. Behold the birth of another idea. So for the whole week and weeks to come, I researched both project ideas and will be meeting with Dr. Tung, Dr. Vahdat, and Dr. Otterburn in the up and coming days. Later on that week I did meet with Dr. Vahdat for clinicals. Some of the patients I had met weeks ago when I was first shadowing her were back for follow-up appointments.