Ben Weppner / Dr. Hooman Kamel - Week 8

Week 8: 07/24/23-07/28/23

For the final week of summer immersion, I shadowed in the neuro ICU, this time with Dr. Murthy. One interesting thing I learned more about was ischemic to hemorrhagic conversion. This is where blood vessels rupture after blood flow has been restored following acute ischemic stroke. This information can directly apply to my research because I have been working with a stroke dataset, so quantifying the risk of hemorrhagic transformation is a potential path I could explore. 

During our weekly meeting, I gave a short presentation on my clinical and research experiences from the past 8 weeks. I explained my time in the neuro ICU, my time in the radiology reading room, and my research project. It was interesting to hear about the experiences of the other students in the program who also presented on Tuesday, especially since their clinical and research experiences were much different than mine.

 

For research, I continued my tests with mathematically fitting curves to patient tissue response from DSC MRI. I tested more complex models that combined the gamma variate and biexponential equations I was using before. While this led to lower mean squared error and L1 error, the much higher complexity of these improved models makes them more difficult to work with outside of fitting to patient data.

 

Overall, the summer immersion term went by quickly, but I am very glad I got to participate for these past 8 weeks. I enjoyed being able to go beyond the lab and see patients that my research could affect in a positive way. It was interesting getting to see the amazing work of many healthcare professionals this summer which was possible because of this program. I plan on applying what I learned to become a better researcher throughout my PhD and beyond. 

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