5th Graders Become Doctors for a Day

TTUHSC Student National Medical Association to Host Mini Camp

• By Suzanna Cisneros
• October 28, 2016

News Release

 

CONTACT:      Suzanna Cisneros, suzanna.cisneros@ttuhsc.edu

                          (806) 743-7605

 

The Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) Student National Medical Association (SNMA) will host the Doctors for a Day Mini Camp from noon to 3 p.m. Oct. 31 at 3601 4^th St. Academic Classroom Building room 100.

 

The mission of the camp is to inspire and inform fifth graders from Post Elementary School to experience a day in the life of a medical student. Kafayat Busari, SNMA president and second-year medical student, said the organization wanted to create an interactive and fun way to expose students to the field of medicine.

 

“I still remember an event I did at a museum at a young age and the impact it had on me,” Busari said. “We wanted to get students thinking about medicine as early as elementary school. The Doctors for a Day Mini Camp hopefully will spark an interest in becoming a physician, especially for underserved and underrepresented minorities.”

 

Steven Berk, M.D., executive vice president, provost and School of Medicine dean, and TTUHSC President Tedd L. Mitchell, M.D., will welcome the students. SNMA will speak about their organization, emphasize the goal of the event and educate the fifth grade students about TTUHSC programs.

 

Students also get hands-on experience at the TTUHSC F. Marie Hall SimLife Center with diagnosing patients with different medical scenarios, work with ultrasound equipment to learn how they are used by physicians, work with simulation mannequins in the simulation lab and also learn CPR to the tune of Staying Alive.

 

“Our goal is to make this fun and interactive for the students and host this camp annually for students throughout West Texas,” Busari said. “Many students may have never imagined they too can go into this profession. Our hope is that the students will walk away knowing they too can become a doctor.”