The Final Week of the Final Frontier

Welcome to the last week of the rest of your lives!!!

Well, the last week of my project that is. I know week after week you all have been waking up every day and longing to read each new installment of this ten part series that is my blog. Not every week was as exciting to read about as some of the more action packed weeks, but I have tried to make each post interesting and fun to read. I have honestly really enjoyed writing them and dramatizing everything that I do. No one wants to read about some guy putting some data into a computer. The people want to read about a young man finding himself by endlessly punching in names after names after names and prescriptions after prescriptions after prescriptions into a small, square laptop that takes FOREVER to load (I mean seriously its 2017 get faster wi-fi) while simultaneously considering the fact that this really should be illegal or be breaking some existing laws like I am looking at a lot of medical information right now.

Anyways, this week in the office consisted of exactly what I did last week which included printing off the results from the five standard tests that are used to check for diabetes. Soo not really anything new happened. I got tighter with Sarah and shes a pretty cool person. Maybe if my project was longer then we could have been as tight as the OG power duo: Carol and I. Alas, I think it is time to move on. I had a lot of great experiences at this doctor's office and it has definitely helped me have a clearer image of what I want my career to look like. I have decided that I don't really want to be a doctor but do something in the field of medicine. I don't know exactly what that is but I am hoping to find out in college (right now I am planning on doing biomedical engineering but we will see).

Outside of the office this week, I finished the rough draft of my power point! The senior project is coming to a close and fast. I can feel it and it feels great. I think my presentation will be pretty good. I mean it will be on a topic that I have been doing research on and participating in for the past ten weeks so I don't think it will be very difficult to talk about. Still not entirely sure exactly what day my final presentation will be on. It's gonna be sometime in May. I can tell you that much. I don't think this is the last post that we are supposed to do. I think I make another one after this, but I could be wrong. Anyways, I had a good last week. I said goodbye to Sarah and Heather and everyone that I have grown to know and love at the office. I wish peace to the world and to everyone reading this post for my last week! Bye bye SRP!

Almost There

Hello avid readers and welcome to the penultimate week of my project!

I'm almost done with the 10 weeks of my senior project! wooooohooooo. These past 2 months have been an emotional roller coaster. There were some good times and there were some bad times. I learned a lot and grew emotionally, spiritually, and geopolitically. Even though Dr. Lalani's office has been a great source of training and knowledge, I think ten weeks is the perfect amount of time for a research project. This way I can become accustomed to and knowledgeable about something and leave before my on-site mentor runs out of things for me to do.

This week in the office went very similar to last week where I would print off the different files of patients that are needed by Heather and various companies that need to check that Lalani's office has followed the standard operating procedure for treating certain conditions. Once again, along with progress notes I printed out what those companies needed, the results from past tests. This week Heather explained to me what the results I was printing out were actually for, which made my life more interesting. Apparently, when a patient has newly diagnosed diabetes, they go through five tests to confirm that they have diabetes, so the doctors have more specific data about the patient's individual case of diabetes.

The five tests are called the Doppler, Nerve Conduction, Smart Skan, Thyroid Biopsy, and a Retinal Scan. I am not sure on the specifics of these tests or how they work, but I know that in a typical diabetes screening all five are utilized.  Similar to last week, I had to look for these five tests that were performed in the year 2016 in the files of the patients in addition to any progress notes that needed to be printed out. Why only 2016? I don't know but I'm sure companies have their reasons. Or maybe they don't have their reasons and they want these files as a joke, in which case this isn't a very funny prank. Anyways even though what I did in the office was not related to the PGX study, I still got to learn a bit about diabetes and continue helping Heather and the other office people with stuff that needs to be done and no one wants to do. Seriously, this one woman treats me like a saint every time I come in, because if I didn't print out this stuff then she would have to do it.

Outside of the office, I have slowly been putting together my power point for the final presentation. I will put the date of the presentation in my next post, because I am drawing a blank on when it is while I'm writing this post. I hope it goes well. It shouldn't be too hard. At least I don't think so. I mean even if it doesn't go well, what are they gonna do? Make me not graduate? On second thought, maybe that's how it works. Welp, we will find out. I gotta go now. I'll see you all next week!