High school students from the Medical Explorer Post have been engaging with the local community, learning skills that will be invaluable as they pursue goals of working in the medical field. The career exploratory program was founded by Richard Selinfreund, Ph.D., an associate professor of pathology at BCOM, who now runs the program along with fellow pathology professor Jennifer Eastwood, Ph.D., and Michael Ogas, a teacher at Onate High School.
The group, which meets two or three times per month, recently got an up-close-and-personal look at the medical profession when they toured the Mesilla Valley DaVita Dialysis Clinic. “Cindy Adams, facility administrator at the clinic, led our students around the clinic,” Dr. Selinfreund said. “She provided them with a brilliant perspective of dialysis from the standpoint of her patients. Our students will be following up with medical studies related to the disease of diabetes that can develop into the requirement for dialysis.”
That same evening, Nurse Laura Jarry from Dona Ana Community College, gave the students an inside look at the intricacies of EKG monitoring. The introductory presentation entailed hooking up 12 lead monitors and recording EKGs on healthy volunteer subjects.
Most of the students involved in the Medical Explorer Post are also members of their school’s Health Occupation Students of America (HOSA) club. Marisol Lozano and Omar Trujillo, both students at Arrowhead Park Early College High School, recently participated in a state HOSA competition where they earned a gold medal in biomedical debate and won second place in CPR/First Aid. “It was a busy three days, but they were successful. Now Omar and I have the opportunity to go to Orlando to compete at an international level,” says Lozano, who was also recently elected as the New Mexico state southern representative for the HOSA organization.
