Monday, March 10, 2008

Am I a nerd?


I went out to lunch with a friend who was very impressed with my board at work (mostly b/c it made me look smart). I didn't write the equations or the matrix, but I do understand what they mean. Does that make me a nerd?

On a related note, Scott asked about some of the projects I have worked on. Here is a sampling for him:

nutrition and memory
nutrition and stress
nutrition and mri findings
child abuse recognition and treatment in a pediatrician office setting
various opthalmology projects
various dermatology projects
various nephrology projects
minimally invasive surgery projects
various GI projects, including some quality of life projects
quality of life for children adopted overseas
various radiation oncology projects
various infectious disease projects
various cardiac disease and stroke projects
AIDS and nutrition

One of my favorite projects was one I worked on very early in my career for minimally invasive surgery. It involved taking CT scans and measuring from a central location to each organ and important structure in the abdominal area in women. This was for the surgeons who went in blind until they could get in a camera and wanted to know about how far they could go without hitting a vital organ/structure without a camera for women with various body types. I guess you have to go in a bit before you can put in a camera. I thought the whole process was fascinating.

3 comments:

Jaydee and Shaunda said...

Maybe not a nerd, but you are way smart. You are a bio-statisician. (I'm sure I spelled that wrong) Your undergrad degree is in something that I can never remember, yet alone say or spell. You are just amazing. I just appreciate all the help you gave Jaydee on his Master's paper and I am counting on you helping me help my children with their math when they enter high school :) I have my degree also, but I never had to take calculus to be a nurse.

Cami said...

Totally nerdy. That's one of the reasons I like you so much!

Scott said...

that's funny, I'm just finishing a paper on a minimally invasive technique: using MRI-guided ultrasound to deliver drugs to a targeted region of the brain.