Come hear me speak!

I gave two versions of my talk today to school groups, but if you want to come out, here's the deal. And not that all the below info doesn't have the real contact info on the web, but just not to advertise personal info too much, that junk has been removed.

Speaker Series Schedule 2009-2010 BioMedTech’s Speaker Series features interactive presentations from leading experts in the field of biomedical technology and engineering. Check back for more up-to-date information.

Saturday, November 7, 2009 at 12:00 PM – General Visitors
Topic: Diabetes: Causes and Consequences
Presented by Kate X, Bridgette X, and Chep X, Ph.D. Candidates, (my school).

In recognition of American Diabetes Month, graduate student researchers will engage the public in understanding the causes and consequences of diabetes, specifically diabetic blindness and heart disease. Students will utilize hands-on demonstrations to explore the anatomy of the eye, simulate vision with diabetic retinopathy (blindness), and observe the fat-sugar-protein ratios in common foods.

Presentation is free with paid admission to Great Lakes Science Center. Space is limited. No reservations required.

Hooray for shots!

I got my seasonal shot on Friday, and I found an H1N1 clinic that is giving the injectable dose tomorrow for Tier 1 groups. Both Sophie and I classify as Tier 1, so we are preregistered and good to go for shots tomorrow. Tim's family has had at least two (maybe more) confirmed cases of swine flu going around. We actually cancelled dinner with his family last night just to be safe--his cousin was home from work for three days with flu, and his aunt wasn't feeling well. Better to be safe than sorry!

And now, I'll have both flu shots before I travel next week. I feel much better about that. Unfortunately, Tim isn't in the high risk group, so he has to wait a bit for the H1N1. His company is doing flu shots next week at work, so at least he'll have that.

I never thought I'd be so happy to get two shots in one week. But I am!

Another note

On another note, I'll have updates from Sophie's big 2-year-old birthday party last week (I'm trying to figure out how to do short videos from longer videos), and I'll have some Halloween pics soon too. It's been wicked busy at work, and Tim's been working late for a project, so I haven't had a lot of time this week. More complete update coming next week, I promise!

Note of the day

Just saw this on Yahoo, and thought I'd pass it along--my last comment about flu shots, I promise (and I finally found someone that has them--I'm getting mine today!)

When moms get flu shot, baby benefits too: study

Travel

I just booked a trip to Salt Lake City for work. There's a collaborator there who is going to teach me a technique that will hopefully help me finish up my project. The city looks like a beautiful place, and the university overlooks a large, undeveloped expanse of wilderness. I won't have time for sight-seeing, since the whole point of the trip is to get as much work done as possible, but I'm excited that I get to venture out to a new city.

It reminded me of another trip that involved lots of travel and not a lot of sight seeing:
It's been over three years since Tim and I drove with my sister to her new job in California. Yes, the white dots were the stops; we foolishly attempted to drive from Cleveland to Amarillo, Texas, in one day. I guess it wasn't an attempt--we did it, but it wasn't fun. And Missouri is still dead to me. The rest of the trip was nice (except for the emergency stop in Gallup). We visited family in Phoenix, and I really loved how beautiful the Southwest was (but man, it was HOT!).

Someday, I'd like to fly out to New Mexico and drive around the west/Southwest. I don't see too much of a need to see the middle of the country--I'm sure it's nice and all, but I do live in Ohio, and it didn't seem that different. Someday, when I make non-student money, Tim and I actually have vacation time, and our current/future children are either old enough to enjoy the trip or are out of the house, we'll take a long vacation. A girl can dream...

And my sister's still out in CA, although she's thinking of going even farther west. What's farther west than California? Japan. Yep, she wants to teach in Japan. No matter what you think, we are genetically related--she's the adventurer, and I'm the homebody. I just live vicariously through her adventures, and she gets to hear about poopy diapers and time outs from me. Maybe that's why she wants to move farther away...

Mis-information

I am somehow now involved in an online pissing match with someone I don't even know on Facebook. It started off that a mutual acquaintance mentioned he was unsure about the swine flu vaccine. By the time I saw the post, a person had posted that the swine flu is made up and the vaccine is more dangerous than the disease. I tried to nicely state that, scientifically, that isn't the case, and she went nuts. I'm so tempted to ramp things up--there's been so much misinformation about the vaccines that I almost lose it every time I hear people spread lies. But, I've decided to just stop checking Facebook for a while. I'm trying to be the calmer, if not better, person.

Just last week, I was driving home, and this stupid shock jock radio host (who I only listen to in order to get traffic reports on the tens) had on an osteopathic practitioner (disclaimer: I have no inherent problems with osteopaths) who claimed that cancer was a vitamin imbalance, modern medicine does nothing for disease, and the flu and H1N1 vaccines were completely unnecessary and even dangerous because of the link between vaccinations and autism/other diseases (which she didn't elaborate on).

First, that autism link is anecdotal, and clinical trials have not shown a correlation. Second, she used bad statistics to say that more people will be hit by lightning than die from swine flu. While, at the time, about 300 people had been confirmed to be killed by H1N1 in the US (that number has risen), if this becomes an epidemic, that number isn't static. As another caller pointed out, that's like saying that since AIDS deaths in the early 80s only killed a few hundred people, it wasn't a public health concern.

I'm still thinking that this H1N1 won't be a massive killing machine, or at least not much worse than seasonal flu (I believe the statistic is that 36,000 die from seasonal flu every year--I'll try to confirm that), I think it is completely irresponsible to fear monger about the ingredients in the vaccine. Give people the proper information and let them decide for themselves! I'm on the list for both the seasonal and the H1N1 shots here. I can't make anyone do anything, but telling them that they'll suffer harm from the inert ingredients is unconscionable. Misinformation makes me crazy, and yet it is such a huge part of what I see every day. I'm lucky enough to work with well educated, scientific minds (for the most part). People are generally rational. Not the case in most of the rest of my world.

I feel that whole cliche, "with great power comes great responsibility." I'm lucky enough to have received (and I continue to receive) a medical education--I feel as though it's part of my job to stop the flow of bad information. I just can't take it too personally when I'm not successful every time.

Busy, busy, and an update coming soon, I promise. Till then, I've been pretty skimpy on the pictures. Here's Sophie's school picture, which we just got back today. And they were able to photo shop out her black eye--hooray!

The general ick

Long time, I know. It's tough to get out of the habit--weeks go by, and I feel like there's nothing so important that I need to blog right now, but I also don't want to just rehash the same old stuff that's been going on every day. Right now, I'm recovering from a disgusting GI thing I've had for the last week. I've been a little off for a few weeks now, but Sunday I was very faint, pale, and dizzy. Then Tuesday night, things erupted (not in a good way), and I had to stay close to a bathroom yesterday. Today I can at least sit upright for more than a few minutes at a time, but I don't feel great. Sophie and Tim had a little touch of it, but as usual, my GI system reacted much worse than theirs.

This whole illness thing has continued to make me realize how nice it is to have family in town. Poor Tim and Sophie have had to fend for themselves food-wise for a few weeks, and although Tim's been doing as much cleaning and maintenance as he can, I had fallen way behind on things like dishes. Sunday night my parents, Jen, and Joe came up. They played with Sophie, they brought steaks to grill and potatoes to mash, Mom washed all my piling-up dishes, and they generally took care of things so I could try to not puke. It was amazing.

Sometimes it's tough to be so close to family. Thank goodness the drama has been pretty calm recently, but that is a very stressful thing when you are a short drive away. At those times, I'm a bit envious of my sister in California, who realistically cannot be expected to fly out every time something goes bad. But really, 99.9% of the time, I love it.

There are the obligations to all the family events (for both Tim and my sides)--which can be very enjoyable, but there are some weekends where all I want to do is relax. That's not a good excuse for missing a graduation party or something similar. Tim and I have instituted a few guidelines--for instance, if we don't get a direct invite via mail/phone/email/etc, then we aren't obligated to go. Posting something on a fridge or sending something to my parents (and expecting it to get to us) aren't enough. We've been married since 2002, and almost everyone is on facebook--there are plenty of easy ways to get a hold of us. There are some exceptions--picnics are almost always word of mouth, and Tim's family is small enough that very rarely are invites sent for anything. We do our best for those. But, if we get an invite, it goes on the calendar, and we do everything to be there.

I do feel like we are busy almost every weekend. We had talked about going into Pittsburgh this weekend to visit a few friends and see the zoo/museums, but between me feeling crappy and the G20 summit, that visit will have to wait. I am going into work on Saturday for a few hours--I took yesterday off to be sick at home (I actually tried to come in but didn't even make it on to the highway), so I'm going to make up some experiment time. Which I don't mind at all--one weekend here or there is nothing like what it used to be!

I do have pictures and things to post at some point. However, I consider the day a success if I shower, go to work, attempt to eat, and get Sophie fed. If I have to crash at 7 PM (which I have), so be it. I can't add anything to my to-do list until I am feeling a bit better. I'll try to blog when I can, but again, no promises. I will hopefully do better than once or twice a month. But we'll see when this bug lets up.

Added: so I reread this and realized I got totally off topic. I'd blame the bug, but I have a habit of that when I am healthy. Anyway, my point was that it's been wonderful to have family around to help, and it's going to be tough to leave for residency. I don't know what the future holds yet, but if there's a way I can have the career I want without having to move, I would definitely consider it. That decision is still years away, but it's going to take some serious convincing to get me to leave willingly. Either that, or I have to pack up my family and move them with us. I'm thinking that's not so likely :)