Mondays at SPRI are a little slow. Most people are doing research in preparation for their labs or testing that take place for the rest of the week. I came in early this morning to hear a presentation from Laurie Goodrich, an Associate Professor of Orthopedics in the Department of Clinical Sciences at the Veterinary Teaching School at CSU. She is doing research around combining gene therapy with stem cell therapy to improve musculoskeletal repair. Specifically, her research is focused around osteoarthritis in horses. I was impressed by the complexity of her study and how much progress she has made. Since the study improved osteoarthritis is horses, Goodrich hopes to do a study using the same technique but with humans instead. This could lead to huge advances in the battle against arthritis. Most of the day after this, I spent researching my LINK project focus. The study is fairly classified so I can't give specific details but it is focused around a ligament of new importance and interest. I am amazed by how complicated a single ligament can be. There is so much information out there pertaining to such a small part of the body. I am actually super excited for this study to be my LINK project. This ligament has barely been researched or tested. In fact, just six months ago was it given a name. Doctors and researchers have been aware it is there but always thought it was attached to or a part of similar looking things around it. It is a crazy thought to me that we are still finding parts of the body. It makes me realize how much we don't know about our own species. It's fairly fascinating.
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Wow what a week. I think I have found a little bit of magic here in Vail. None of it is what I expected to find yet every moment has been wonderful. I am feeling very very grateful. Every time I explain to someone why I am here and what I am doing their amazed reaction makes me realize just how lucky I am. The opportunity of a three week internship, anywhere in the world, while in high school is basically unheard of. Added to that, I am lucky enough to have found somewhere with a ridiculous amount of opportunity. Ahh actually so cool. I can't even believe this is my life right now.
When I left Durango, I definitely felt a sense of melancholy. I was sad to leave all the people I was used to seeing on a daily basis. I wasn't sure how internship was going to work out. I didn't know what I would be doing or even if I was going to like the field I had chosen. It was weird to set off on an adventure with so much uncertainty. On the drive up I a felt ridiculously free. I was driving across the state, alone, to embark on the uncertain. I had never felt this before and I kind of enjoyed it, but there was also a little feeling of doubt if it was going to work out or not. Now that I have been here for week, I realize how much I actually love the freedom. I cruise to work everyday, do my thing (play with robots, explore the inside of hips- you know the usual) and then I come home go to sleep and do it again the next day. I finally feel like a real person and its sort of wonderful. Although I do miss people in Durango, I am enjoying doing this on my own. I think it is making me stronger, more confident, more capable, and definitely giving me a bigger picture of the world. I've definitely had to put myself out there a few times and every time afterwards I have been glad I took the risk. So yeah, just some thoughts. Really looking forward to the next two weeks. Wow what a day. I started off by meeting at the office at 8:00 AM, grabbing my skis, and heading to the mountain with David, one of the research assistants. My mentor was nice enough to let us ski all morning. We ended up finding a hidden stash of untouched powder that we ripped up for the next four hours. We also met up with Marco, one of the international fellows from Italy. David needed to head back to the office so I stayed with Marco, and was able to talk to him about his experiences in the medical field in Italy. Around 1:00 PM we headed back to the hospital. After a quick lunch I was lucky enough to shadow both a endoscopic FAI hip repair and a joint MCL and LCL knee repair, both on cadavers. The fellows preforming the surgeries were happy to answer question and let me try out a few of the steps. Christiano, who was working on the hip, let me guide the camera, flush out the joint, and put in sutures. I was fairly mesmerized by the whole process. The whole idea of doing a surgery endoscopically is really cool and I was amazed by how easy the fellows made it look and how hard it actually was. After Christiano finished the repair he let me "play around in the joint". It was really cool to weave my way through a hip joint. It made me realize just how complex the hip is. After this David and I cleaned the lab and finished up for the day. He told me how lucky I am to do this and that most surgeons don't get to do a hip scope until a few years after med school. As we packed up, Adriana and David were nice enough to offer to let me come with them to the Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros concert that was taking place because of the Burton US Open Snowboarding Chamipionships happening in Vail this week. We headed over to the main plaza where they set up a stage in the middle of the road. Edward Sharpe was wonderful. I was thoroughly impressed. It was awesome to be able to go to the concert with some of the people working at SPRI. They are really wonderful people and I am so thankful to spend time with them and get to know them. Overall, it was a fairly magical day. *Feeling grateful Wow, people here are wonderful. I already feel like I have made some awesome friends and connections. Even the concierge excitedly wave to me every morning. Everyone is interested about my story and genuinely wants to be of help if needed. It is wonderful to be in this type of environment all the time- it feels a little Animas-y.
Unfortunately the cadaver knee lab did not happen today, but I was told I can expect a hip and a knee lab tomorrow, so I am looking forward to that. This morning we did more robot training revolving around the nitty-gritty of programming. Although it was fairly tiring I understood a lot more of it than I thought I would and now have a fairly good understanding of how to control Rosie. In the afternoon I talked with my mentor, Kelly Adair, about ideas for my LINK project. It is fairly hard to complete the kind of projects SPRI generally does in just three weeks, but Kelly had some ideas on how to work around that. We talked about continuing a study on the effectiveness of the knee brace using the Biomotion Lab, doing a testing on a newly found ligament in the knee, testing a hip repair procedure, or writing a "Surgeries for Dummies" book on a specific hip repair surgery that Dr. LaPrade specializes in. It is exciting to lay out my options and really see how much possibility there is here. Although I didn't decide on a project it was nice to narrow my options down and I plan on starting it early next week. After this, I conducted the Mentor Interview that is required for LINK. I was amazed by how insightful Kelly is. After hearing his about his life, I really felt like I could connect with him. He gave me some wonderful advice that I have been thinking about all day. As I packing up to leave for the day, I started talking to Adriana, one of the research assistants. We talked about college and her insight on a big public university. It was really nice to leave the professional tone and talk with someone about things we could both relate to. People are so cool.
I am very proud of myself. Without Google Maps, asking for directions, or large amounts of confusion, I successfully made it to work today. This is no small feat for me. I had to navigate through two towns, enter and exit a free way, find parking (which is almost impossible in Vail), locate the main entrance, and weave my way through a ridiculous amount of hallways. My successful morning was the perfect lead into a successful day that started with a tour of SPRI's biomotion lab, which is used for a variety of testing. Its main function is to map out the body's movements while preforming physical activity. The lab has turf, artificial ice, goals, stairs, treadmills, and an array of additional sports equipment. Some of the studies using the lab have involved collecting data on rehabilitation, initial injuries, the amount of pressure or force that is being exerted on bones and muscles, the effectiveness of sports braces, and much more. I am amazed by the possibility of this lab. I think it might be cool to center my LINK project around it. After the tour, I went back to working on the KUKA robot with Matt and David. Mary Goldsmith, the Robotics Engineer at SPRI, presented them with a task that proved to be quite the challenge. It was really fun listening to them problem solve with advanced concepts revolving around coordinate plains and vectors, but also simple math like trig and averaging points that they had forgotten. I found myself knowing the answer to some of their struggles, but also being impressed by the amount of knowledge they had that was much past my level. We ended the day by learning how to program and write code for the robot.
I think I like it here. First day.
Lots of big words. Got lost multiple times. Feeling like a real live person. This morning I attended the fellow research update presentations. People are doing really cool stuff. Holy cow so many big words though. After that, I learned how to control a huge robot used for testing. It is called the KUKA and it is huge and orange and they should not trust me to operate it. After a lunch that turned into an advice session about my life path, David, Matt, (two research engineers) and I cruised back down to the KUKA for some more "training". It turned into a competition where we got to command the robot to do things like pick up scissors and place them in a tube or write a letter on a sticky note. It proved to be much harder than one would think. After this, we worked on the robot for another hour or so doing calibrations and mastering. I talked to my mentor for a while afterwards and just like that the day was over. So yes, it was a successful day. It was not what I expected to be doing, but I learned a ton of new things and am excited for tomorrow. |