Pushing Progress

So far on my ISM journey, I have learned so much about obstetrics and gynecology and I continue to be captivated by the field. Last week was my first Research Portfolio presentation where I was able to showcase my weeks of work to my peers. At the time of the presentation, I had conducted five interviews and had completed six research assessments which ranged from paternal age and perinatal morbidity to the impact of placental positioning. Admittedly, I was nervous about speaking for eight to ten minutes, but something I learned from the experience of presenting was that if you truly are passionate about your topic and you are immersed in your research, then eight to ten minutes of presentation is quite simple to achieve. My ability to accomplish this goal that I did not think was possible before has given me hope for my final presentation. If I can get through ten minutes of discussing my work over the past eleven weeks, I can surely get through thirty minutes of elaborating upon my year-long progress. In addition to presenting, I have also made a considerable amount of progress on my Original Work, which although it is painstaking to comprehend thousands of pages of medical terminology, is really fascinating. I am honestly incredibly happy with my topic and I do not know what would have interested me as much as placenta accreta. The fact that it is such a challenging topic with no alternative treatments motivates me to conduct further research on the topic in hopes that I will discover something unique and groundbreaking. So far, I have conducted around 11 hours of research and am in the process of reading a free, full-text book called the "Vascular Biology of the Placenta", which provides me with a rich database of information to draw context about the placenta from. My progress so far motivates me for what I will accomplish in the near future and I am incredibly thrilled to see what I will do.