An Introduction

Hey there! My name is Komal and welcome to my first blog! As a senior at BASIS Scottsdale High School, I get the opportunity to spend my last trimester of high school at an internship site of my choice,  and I will be able to share everything I learn with you guys! I will be doing some research in a topic that I have had an interest in since 7th grade: orthopedics.

I first became interested in the muscular and skeletal system in 7th grade, when I found out I had torn my medial meniscus. Not being sure what that is, I did a lot of research about it. I became very fascinated and ended up learning about the anatomy of the entire knee. But after my surgery, my curiosity started to die down. But in my junior year of high school, I took a capstone anatomy class that helped me rediscover my interest in the muscular and skeletal system. Ever since, I have been thinking about pursuing a career in orthopedics. But before I committed to that decision, I wanted to gain some experience in orthopedics. Over the summer of 2015, I volunteered at The CORE Institute, an orthopedic clinic. I learned they not only have a clinic (where hundreds of patients come to visit the dozens of doctors that work there), but they also sponsor a musculoskeletal research and education foundation, called The MORE Foundation. The MORE Foundation is where I will be doing my research for my senior project.

So what exactly will I be doing? Well I got in contact with a doctor who works with The MORE Foundation, and he helped me join a project that is determined to develop an algorithm that will help doctor diagnose an infected total knee arthroplasty (what is that? A fancier way of saying knee replacement). You might me thinking, "Why can't a surgeon diagnose it himself? And how in the world is an algorithm going to help diagnose an infected knee?" Well diagnosing a total knee arthroplasty can be tricky, especially to an inexperienced surgeon. The reason is because there is no laboratory test that gives doctors a “yes” or “no” answer to whether or not a patient has an infection. And an infection inside the knee isn't something that can be concluded just from looking at the superficial surface of the knee. To diagnose and infected total knee arthroplasty, doctors have to perform a physical examination and consider the signs and symptoms (yes, there is a difference!) of the patient, and when there is suspicion of an infection, they must complete a few laboratory tests. These test won't give the surgeon a direct answer, but they will provide the doctor with test result values that may indicate an infection. But with multiple numbers to look at, doctors might struggle in deciding if there is an infection present. The algorithm we hope to develop will allow doctors across the nation to insert the test results into a webpage to give the doctor an answer such as “negative with 90% confidence” or “positive with 70% confidence.” We hope this website will make it easier for doctors to conclude if a patient has an infected total knee arthroplasty or not.

Feel free to learn more about The MORE Foundation and the CORE Institute by clinking on the links in the sidebar. For a more detailed description of my project, click on “My Proposal,” also found on the side bar.

I can’t wait to start and I hope all of you will follow along with me. See you guys on the next blog!