Week 4 - Erica Wagner

During my fourth week of clinical immersion, I was able to watch Dr. Chandwani perform a surgery to remove tumors on a patient’s pancreas. This was my first time ever witnessing a surgery, so I was a little nervous to see the entire process. After samples of the primary tumor were removed, Dr. Chandwani also found tumors on the colon which were sent to pathology for analysis. The results came back as a carcinoma, but the technician was not able to tell if the tumor originated from the pancreas or colon. This was a critical detail that would determine the remainder of the surgery. If the tumors on the colon were derived from the pancreas, then this would mean that the pancreatic cancer had metastasized, and surgery would no longer be a viable treatment option. If the tumor was derived from the colon, then this would be removed along with the tumor on the pancreas. We visited pathology to look at the slides and discuss with the technicians there. After some deliberation, it was sadly found that the tumors on the colon were pancreatic which means the original tumor had metastasized. After getting these results, the surgery ended as chemotherapy would be the next best treatment.

In Dr. Chen’s lab, I have now started 6 beta cell differentiations. Also, my first differentiation which I started in June was successful! The cells expressed GFP which means they also expressed insulin as this cell line is a reporter line. Moreover, I finished sectioning the pancreatic islets, started sectioning cerebral organoids, and started immunostaining the pancreatic islets. I am set to image the islets on Monday and will hopefully have time to start immunostaining the cerebral organoids later next week.

Over the weekend, I visited the 9/11 Memorial Museum and the Empire State Building. I also went to the American Museum of Natural History including their new exhibit of Mignone Halls of Gems and Minerals.

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