The Wayne State University School of Medicine’s annual Medical Student Research Symposium returned to in-person presentations Feb. 3 in Scott Hall, with students presenting more than 80 abstracts, many working collaboratively in categories that included basic science and clinical research, as well women’s health research, medical education research, and public health and community engagement.
The annual event was organized and hosted by the Office of Medical Student Research Programs.
The symposium gave students an opportunity to discuss and deliberate research and accompanying results with fellow students and faculty, and strengthened the message that clinicians can have fulfilling research careers.
All WSU medical students were eligible to submit abstracts on a research project to which they made a significant contribution in their undergraduate or graduate years.
Winners, announced Feb. 15, include:
Basic Science Studies
1st Place: Scott Baughan, “Functional Analysis Provides Insight into Missing Heritability”
2nd Place: Harry Ramos, “Loss of Connective Tissue Growth Factor Expression Promotes Remodeling of the Extracellular Matrix and Epithelial-to-Mesenchymal Transition in Ovarian Cancer”
3rd Place: Mehrnoosh Ghafouri, “Inhibitors of Histone Deacetylase and MCL-1 Synergistically Reduce Proliferation in Malignant Melanoma”
Medical Education Research
1st Place: Chelsea Yu, “Assessing Peer Mentor Skill Development in Participating in a Novel Medical Student Mentoring Initiative”
2nd Place: Matthew Corsi, “Top 100 Urology Influences on Twitter: Is Social Media Influence Associated with Academic Impact?”
3rd Place: Sean McCarthy and Iyanna Peppers, “The Impact of Reforming the Medical Student Admissions Training Process on Medical Student Interviewers”
Women’s Health
1st Place: Maurgan Lee, Lucki Word and Mayra Shafique, “Gender and Financial Implications of Parental Leave Utilization at a Major U.S. Academic Institution”
Clinical Research Studies
1st Place: Arielle Best, “Outcomes of Dupilumab Treatment in Patients Presenting with Severe Asthma or Chronic Rhinosinusitis with Nasal Polyps, Over the Age of 65”
2nd Place: Dominic Alessio-Bilowus, “Surgical Management of Velopharyngeal Dysfunction: Major Techniques and Trends for the 21st Century”
3rd Place (Tie): Crisshy Auguste, “Failure to Treat HCV in Patients Seen in a Predominately African American Socioeconomically Challenged Population”
3rd Place (Tie): Bhargav Ayloo, “Staged Laser Interstitial Thermal Therapy for the Surgical Treatment of Insular Glioma: A Case Series”
Public Health and Community Engagement
1st Place: Alexis Malecki, Rachel Feldstein and Mikaela Grudzien, “Evaluating Implementation of Recognition-Based Incentive program (RBIP) During Service-Learning Curriculum”
2nd Place (Tie): Austin Mueller, “The Impact of Caregiver and Community Education on Influenza Vaccination Acceptance”
2nd Place (Tie): Erika Polanco, “Sun Protection Intervention for Urban Youth”
3rd Place: Bohdan Matsko, “The Effect of a Magnetic Resonance Imaging Sedation Protocol on Increasing Sedation Related Adverse Event Reporting Frequency and Anesthesia Utilization in the Henry Ford Health System”