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Volume
2, Issue 2 Sponsored by: The National Institute on Aging, The John A. Hartford Foundation, The Community Health Foundation of Western and Central New York, The Cleveland Foundation, the Cardinal Health Foundation and the Lillian R. Gleitsman Foundation
Administered by: The American Federation for Aging Research (AFAR) and the National Institute on Aging (NIA) ____________________________________ This online newsletter provides news and information about the Medical Student Research Training in Aging (MSTAR) Program to current and former student scholars, program directors, mentors, and others involved in the program. PLEASE HELP US DISSEMINATE THIS NEWSLETTER to medical students and others in your institution. It is one of the best ways to promote this valuable program to potential applicants. Thank You!
This newsletter is published three times a year. Watch for the next
issue in December 2007. ____________________________________ The Next MSTAR Program Application Deadline is February 7, 2008 The new application form will be available soon at http://www.afar.org/medstu.html ____________________________________ 1. Calling All Former Scholars to Complete Program
Survey ____________________________________________ Former Scholars Needed to Complete Upcoming Survey
_____________________________________________ When he was a medical student
at Baylor College of Medicine, Dr. Amit Shah’s classmates nicknamed him
“Mr. Geriatrics.” After all, Dr. Shah was President of Baylor’s Geriatrics
Student Interest Group. But he didn’t always want to be a doctor. As an
undergraduate, Dr. Shah studied chemical engineering at Washington
University in St. Louis. So how did a man who once proclaimed himself
“anti-physician” become a geriatrician?
In 2000, as a second-year medical student at Baylor, Dr. Shah became an
MSTAR scholar and completed his research project at Baylor. With his
mentor, Dr. Mark Kunik, he studied the spiritual and religious coping of
caregivers of Alzheimer’s disease patients. He went to various Alzheimer’s
support group meetings in Houston and gave talks on the disease. In
return, members completed surveys for him.
“What really stuck with me from my research experience was meeting the
family members of people with Alzheimer’s disease and seeing the
tremendous need that people have for geriatric care,” he says. “I was
surprised at how I could take some of the burden off the caregivers by
helping them see that it was the disease that was causing their loved one
to act a certain way, and by giving them tactical techniques for dealing
with the disease.”
Dr. Shah says he enjoyed going to the support group meetings and
speaking with caregivers from various socioeconomic groups. “I went from
the ritziest areas in Houston to the most blue collar areas and saw that
everyone has to cope with many of the same issues,” he says. “Of course,
things like affording a paid caregiver are easier if you have money, but
some of the burdens of caring for a loved one with Alzheimer’s disease are
similar regardless of your circumstances.” He also enjoyed the overall
experience of taking part in the MSTAR program, especially attending the
AGS annual meeting and getting to know so many other students who were
interested in aging. “I realized I wasn’t the only one!” he says. Dr. Shah
got to complete his project from start to finish, and ended up publishing
his study in the journal, Clinical Gerontologist. Most important, he feels
the program helped him choose his future career path. “I realized I liked
teaching and really wanted to go into academia.”
Dr. Shah also credits the geriatricians at Baylor for fostering his
interest in geriatrics, particularly Dr. Anita Woods, who started Baylor’s
Geriatrics Student Interest Group and is currently Chair of the MSTAR
selection committee; Dr. Kunik, his research mentor; and Dr. Carmel Dyer,
now the Chief of Geriatrics at UT Houston. “They opened up many
opportunities for me,” he recalls. “I developed a really positive view of
geriatrics. The more I learned about it, the more exciting it became and
the more interested I became in it.”
Dr. Shah graduated from Baylor in 2002. Then, he did a three-year
residency at the University of Illinois-Chicago, followed by a two-year
geriatrics fellowship at Johns Hopkins. In August, 2007, he joined the
faculty of UT Southwestern Medical Center. He will do clinical work in
geriatric medicine and teach medical students, residents, and fellows.
Half of his clinical time will be spent making house calls – taking
students to visit homebound, usually elderly patients. The rest of his
time will be spent working in the outpatient geriatrics clinic. He will
also spend two months a year in the inpatient acute medicine ward, and he
will mentor a small group of students each year.
Dr. Shah plans to spend the next several years building his career at
Southwestern, and is confident that he will enjoy academic medicine. He
will also always love geriatrics. “What makes geriatrics unique is being a
master of subtlety and complexity. There’s the patient with subtle
presentations of disease, and then there’s the patient with 14 different
conditions,” he says. “Some people get turned off by these challenges, but
I like them. I won’t get bored. It will be interesting to me forever.”
_____________________________________________ Profile on 2006 MSTAR Scholar Daneng Li 2006 MSTAR scholar Daneng Li’s
first foray into geriatrics began at a student activities fair at Weill
Medical College of Cornell University, where he is currently a third year
student. Li, in his first year at the time, got a “good feeling” from some
members of the school’s Geriatrics Interest Group, so he joined. He
immediately developed a fondness for geriatrics.
The following summer, Li received an MSTAR grant and did his research
project at Weill Cornell. His mentor was Dr. Arti Hurria, an oncologist
and geriatrician who was then on the faculty at Memorial Sloan Kettering
Medical Center and is currently the Director of The Cancer and Aging
Research Program at City of Hope. Together, they created a geriatric
assessment tool to be completed by hospitalized patients that would help
to identify vulnerable older adults with cancer. Using the data gleaned
from the geriatric assessment tool, they sought to identify predictors of
distress in older patients with cancer, with the hope that they could
quickly screen for those individuals and help them have better outcomes.
Li found that the geriatric assessment tool was very feasible. Patients
completed the questionnaire in 15 minutes on average, and their
satisfaction with it was high. Ninety-four percent of patients stated that
the questionnaire was easy to comprehend, 96 percent said that there were
no upsetting questions, and 89 percent felt that the questionnaire did not
omit any important questions. Sixty-seven percent reported that they had
experienced some form of distress. The need for assistance with physical
function appears to be the greatest predictor of distress in older
patients with cancer.
And publish a paper, he did. He and Dr. Hurria have had an article,
entitled “Identifying Vulnerable Older Adults with Cancer Integrating
Geriatric Assessment Oncology Practice,” accepted in the Journal of
American Geriatrics Society. They are currently working on a second
submission, entitled “Predictors of Distress in Older Patients with
Cancer.”
Li has now begun his clinical rotations at Weill Cornell. Currently, he
is in the OB/GYN clerkship at New York Presbyterian Hospital. His typical
day begins at 4:30 AM and does not end until 8:30 PM.
Li is also still a member of the Geriatrics Interest Group, in which he
has found a safety net. “The faculty is really accessible. We can go and
talk to them about anything, and they really help us out,” he says.
“That’s extremely difficult to find in medical school, because the faculty
members are so busy.” Two of the geriatricians he finds so supportive are
Dr. Ron Adelman, a member of the MSTAR National Selection Committee and
Co-Chair of Cornell’s Division of Geriatrics and Gerontology; and Dr.
Carol Capello, one of the directors of the MSTAR summer program at Weill
Cornell and an advisor for the Geriatrics Interest Group. In 2003, Dr.
Adelman started the Henry Adelman Fund for Medical Student Education,
which provides monetary support for Weill Cornell students to conduct
aging research, who have not been funded through the MSTAR program.
Of his experience in the MSTAR program, Li says, “It really made me
become aware of how important geriatrics is. I realized I want to involve
some aspects of geriatrics in my career because I had a great experience
with all of the activities in the MSTAR program.” Li believes all medical
students should have exposure to geriatrics. “Now that I’m in a hospital,
I see that some residents and attending physicians have the idea that if
you’re old, you’re just going to be sick anyway,” he says. “But through my
research, I’ve learned that that’s not necessarily true. A person’s
chronological age doesn’t always match up with their functional age. It’s
sad that we still have physicians and residents who don’t know that.” Li
also points out that baby boomers will soon be part of the geriatric
population themselves. “It’s very important for all people pursuing a
career in medicine to know something about that age group to better treat
their patients in the long run.”
Li is not yet sure what field he’d like to pursue in his career. It
will be a choice between oncology and ear, nose and throat (ENT), an area
in which he did a lot of research before medical school. If he goes into
oncology, he’ll most likely follow his mentor’s path and become a
geriatric oncologist. If he chooses ENT, he hopes to combine all three
fields.
Li advises future MSTAR scholars to keep an open mind and to take
advantage of every experience the program offers them. And, now that he is
so busy, he also urges them to enjoy themselves while working on their
research projects. “It will probably be your last free summer in medical
school!” he jokes.
_____________________________________________ May 2007
Student Poster Session and Luncheon a Success Over 120
medical students and students from other health professional disciplines
gathered to present their research at the annual AGS/AFAR/John A. Hartford
Foundation Student Poster Session and Luncheon, held during the May 2007
AGS Annual Meeting in Seattle, WA. Of the student presenters, about 80
were 2006 MSTAR scholars. Students always give the poster session high
marks for the networking and mentoring opportunities it provides, as they
discuss their research findings with peers and leaders in geriatrics and
aging research. Speaking at the luncheon were Gavin Hougham, Ph.D.,
representing the John A. Hartford Foundation; Mark Lachs, M.D.,
representing AFAR, and Jerry Johnson, M.D., representing the AGS
Foundation for Health in Aging.
The session is generously supported by the AGS Foundation for Health in
Aging Student Researcher Fund, which also provides travel stipends for
students who present research at the AGS annual meeting.
2007 MSTAR scholars will receive information about presenting their
research at the next Student Poster Session to be held on Saturday, May 3,
2008, at the AGS Annual Meeting in Washington, DC. 2007 AGS Annual Meeting Student Poster
Session _____________________________________________ Boston University Summer Institute in Geriatric Medicine: AGS Local Geriatrics Mentoring Program: Geriatrics career information, including profiles of
geriatricians: AGS Resident Recruitment Initiative: www.americangeriatrics.org/education/residents/
AGS student chapters and other information for medical students: www.americangeriatrics.org/education/geristudents/
American Medical Student Association (AMSA) Geriatrics Interest
Group: American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) Organization of Student
Representatives: AAMC Careers in Medicine program helps students select a specialty and
apply to residency: MSTAR information and online application: www.afar.org/medstu.html
_____________________________________________
If you have news or announcements you would like mentioned in our next newsletter, please forward them to grants@afar.org. |
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Dr. Shah says several experiences contributed to his change of
heart. He’d enjoyed volunteering at a nursing home in high school, so
during college he started a volunteer program at a local veterans
long-term care facility and recruited several premedical students. “We
developed relationships with the veterans,” he says. “It was fantastic to
talk with them.” He began to realize that he wanted to work with older
people. “I was too much of a people person for engineering.” Dr. Shah then
worked on a bioengineering project and developed an interest in biology.
“Next thing I knew, I had joined ‘the enemy’ and become premed,” he jokes.
Li then presented his research at the May 2007 American
Geriatrics Society (AGS) Annual Meeting Presidential Poster Session in
Seattle, WA. He was pleasantly surprised that the AGS session was not as
competitive as other poster sessions he’d attended. “It was actually very
laid back. People asked questions and helped each other develop their
research,” he explains. “I got some great advice about how I could revise
my presentation so I could eventually publish a paper.”
