SNOW HILL – Students in the biomedical science program at Worcester Technical High School shared their solutions to real world problems as they completed their senior internships this month.
Each of the 12 seniors in Aarti Sangwan’s class at Worcester Tech was tasked with creating an innovation that would improve operations at their various internship locations. They presented the innovations, their capstone projects, to an audience of fellow students and mentors last week.
“They came up with a problem and worked on a solution,” Sangwan said. “It went really well.”
In the past, students in the school’s biomed program have participated in internships in the community and have done presentations outlining those internships. This year, Sangwan wanted them to take things a step further. She asked them to take a close look at operations during their internships and to come up with a potential improvement. That improvement and the reasoning behind it was what the students shared during their capstone presentations.
“The goal was for them to go into scientific details,” Sangwan said. “To create something and back it up with scientific information.”
Because the internships varied significantly, so did the innovations. Eva Fermin worked as an intern at Atlantic General Hospital. There, in the intensive care section, she noticed there was no pneumatic tubing system to transfer medications to and from other parts of the hospital. Instead, nurses physically carried the medication back and forth. The only tubing system the hospital had was serving the emergency room.
“I saw there was an inefficient way of delivering medication,” Fermin said.
To remedy that, Fermin presented plans for a tubing system that could reach four departments instead of one.
“It would decrease wait time,” Fermin said.
Biomed student Olivia Kurtz interned at the Shirley Grace Pregnancy Center. The more time she spent there, the more she realized most community members had little idea of what services the center provided.
“I found there was a lack of knowledge about what they do,” she said.
To address that, she created a variety of marketing strategies designed to increase awareness.
Shannon Mowbray spent her time at the Hanger Clinic dealing with prosthetics and patients who used them. It didn’t take her long to learn that prosthetic limbs lasted an average of three to four years while insurance companies only funded new prosthetics every five to seven years.
“Patients are walking around on damaged limbs,” she said.
Though she didn’t actually produce it, Mowbray came up with plans for a specially formulated silicone spray that could be applied to prosthetics to lengthen their lifespan.
She and Sangwan’s other students said they valued the hands-on experience their internships had provided them.
“You’re not treated like a student you’re treated like an employee,” Mowbray said.
Sangwan said by asking the students to not only complete an internship but also to explore potential innovations related to the related field, they were challenged beyond a high school level. She said staff at the organizations the students worked with were impressed.
“They say these students are doing things they did in college,” she said.
Student Lexi Harrison said the projects also showed the biomedical program participants the importance of innovation, particularly in a scientific field. She said she hoped to see capstone projects completed by future students.
“Things change all the time,” she said. “This’ll help future students be involved in what’s new.”
Students who completed biomedical science capstone projects this year included Fermin, Mowbray, Kurtz, Harrison, Madison Clark, Daniel Moyer, Tyra Corbin, Paige Kreppel, Paige Nichols, Dajsia Shockley, Jacob Ciurca and Tara Somers.
