.png)
.png)
Assistant Professor
Baylor College of Medicine
Disclosure(s): Merck Sharpe & Dohme: Grant/Research Support
My experience as an MD/PhD has been a variegated and unique one. My exposure to bioinformatics during my graduate training in Genetic Epidemiology and Big Data during my PhD training has shaped the way in which I approach medicine in the era of the Electronic Health Records (EHRs). I had my first foray into informatics during my Masters training when I developed a series of computer programs to collect, parse, and aggregate genetic data from queries of large publicly available databases to focus selection of Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms for genetic research. During my residency training I focused my efforts developing a series of computer programs that would parse the EHR and systematically re-write themselves to adapt to the varied input data to determine rates of medication side-effects. It is this background that has given me a unique perspective to medicine and nurtured my unconventional approach to data processing, informatics, and research. During my clinical fellowship in pediatric infectious disease, I used similar high-throughput informatics to understand the healthcare associated costs of congenital CMV and better understand the progression of this disease and its many sequelae throughout time. Now as faculty, I hope to expand this approach to other congenital infections, specifically congenital syphilis, to help undersgtand trends in rising case rates as well advocate for this vulnerable patient population. I have chosen to continue to pursue clinical informatics because I recognize the impact this field can have on care delivery and clinical research in an increasingly digitized world. I fully expect to continue to use these skills to further integrate the readily available digital clinical information into clinical workflow and use real-time patient data to drive clinical research and decision making across any field of medicine.