From The Labs

Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery Research Day

 

On June 10 and 11, the Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery presented its 13th annual Research Day. The event highlighted the academic achievements of the department’s residents, fellows, staff and students through a session of scientific posters and a morning of back-to-back oral presentations.

The event embraced the mission of the department’s research program  ̶  to conduct important research in surgical disease that will improve treatment and quality of life for affected patients and to train future leaders in academic surgery. Trainees and staff presented work that spanned the department’s divisions and affiliated hospitals. Their accomplishments also reflected the outstanding mentorship provided by faculty members.

L-R: Drs. Todd Rosengart, guest speaker Erik van Zwet and Livia Eberlin.

The keynote speaker this year was Dr. Erik van Zwet, an associate professor of medical statistics at the Department of Biomedical Data Sciences of the Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands. Dr. van Zwet completed his B.A. and M.A. in mathematics at the University of Leiden, and a Ph.D. in mathematical statistics at the University of Utrecht. After a postdoc at the University of California, Berkeley, he joined the mathematics department of the University of Leiden as an assistant professor and later the University Hospital. Dr. van Zwet served on the regional Ethical Review Board for 13 years.

After seeing hundreds of trial protocols, he became very interested in how medical research is conducted. He has established the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDRS) to be the ideal resource to study this. The CSDR is arguably the most comprehensive collection of evidence on medical interventions. It holds thousands of meta-analyses covering tens of thousands of clinical trials. Dr. van Zwet has developed new methods to study these data, which has resulted in an entirely different look at clinical trials. His talk, “A Different Look at Clinical Trials,” discussed his perspective on this topic.

By the numbers
  • More than 200 people attended the event each day, 225 on June 10 and 248 on June 11 (despite the rain that day).
  • Attendees included resident fellows, students, staff, faculty and volunteers.
  • Abstracts submitted – 156
  • Posters presented  ̶  57
  • Abstract of Distinction oral presentations  ̶  15
  • Quick Shot oral presentations  ̶  6
Awards

The awardees for each of the presentation categories were:

Poster Competition Presenter Faculty mentor
Innovation Dr. Tyler Guinn Dr. Ravi Ghanta
Outcome Health Services & Quality Safety Dr. Alexandra Buda Dr. N. Thao N. Galvan
Education Dr. Emma Burke Dr. Peter Boedecker
Staff – Basic Science Miguel Mendez Sosa Dr. Ravi Ghanta
Staff – Clinical Winston Owens Dr. William Pederson
Student – Basic Science Jacob Mardick Dr. Livia Eberlin
Student -Clinical Dr. Keziah Liebenberg Dr. Livia Eberlin
Resident – Basic Science Dr. Mary Elizabeth Guerra Dr. Swathi Balaji
Resident – Clinical Dr. Travis Miles Dr. Ravi Ghanta
Postdoctoral  Fellow – Basic Science Dr. Sanjib Sarkar Dr. Hu Ying Shen
Postdoctoral Fellow – Clinical Dr. Junsang Cho Dr. Iki Adachi
Quick Shot Awardees Presenter Faculty mentor
Innovation Dr. Michael Tuck Dr. Livia Eberlin
Education Dr. Henry Olana Soler Dr. Nilson Salas
Basic Science Staff Saliha Pathan Dr. Ravi Ghanta
Clinical Staff Dr. Melissa Munoz Beilis Dr. Gabriel Loor
Basic Science Resident Dr. Ava Mokhtari Dr. Jessica Cardenas
Clinical Postdoctoral Fellow Dr. Dora Babocs Dr. Gustavo Oderich
Abstract of Distinction Competition Presenter  Faculty mentor
Outcomes in Health Services and Quality Safety Dr. Sarah Peiffer Dr. Alice King
Student -Basic Science Trevor Godfrey Dr. Livia Eberlin
Student – Clinical Josephine Schmidt Dr. Lucas Dvoracek
Resident -Clinical Dr. Trenton Gluck Dr. William Cohn
Postdoctoral Fellow – Basic Science Dr. Abou Bakr Salama Dr. Tamer Mohamed

 

The event was successful thanks to all who were involved in its planning and execution.

Program Chairs:

Dr. Todd Rosengart, professor and DeBakey-Bard Chair at the Department of Surgery.

Dr. Livia Eberlin, professor and Vice Chair for Research at the Department of Surgery.

Scientific Committee:

Dr. Kimberly Holloway, senior communications associate at the Department of Surgery, was the chair of the Scientific Program, which included 33 faculty members.

Planning Committee: included eight members of the department.

Learn more about Research Day, including details on all the presentations, here.

All photos courtesy of Dr. N.K. Mondal.

 

By Ana María Rodríguez, Ph.D.

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