Lauren Swarynski
	2010
	Bioengineering
	Yale University School of Medicine
	Physician Associate Program

What do you do in your current position? I am currently attending graduate school to become a physician assistant (PA). I have already completed one year of didactic curriculum and am now participating in 14 different month-long clinical rotations throughout Connecticut and across the country. These rotations allow me to get experience in all areas of medical practice, including primary care, emergency medicine, internal medicine, geriatrics, pediatrics, psychiatry, general surgery, and multiple sub-specialties. I will also complete a thesis investigating an Obstetric/Gynecologic problem prior to graduation in December 2012.

How has your PSU engineering education/experiences helped to get you where you are today? During my time at Penn State, my major, Bioengineering, and my membership in the Schreyer Honors College helped me to obtain many positions that allowed me to discover what I truly love to do. After attending the spring engineering career fair in 2007, I got a summer job as an intern for a Johnson & Johnson company called Ortho-Clinical Diagnostics where I was exposed to the business-side of engineering and medicine. I enjoyed the experience, but wanted to take care of people in a closer, more personal way than from behind-the-scenes product engineering. After my internship, I began to work in a neuroscience laboratory on campus to complete research for my undergraduate thesis. My “in” with this lab came when a professor from my inorganic chemistry course approached me and offered me the opportunity to work with his wife (also a professor at Penn State). My two and a half years spent doing research in the lab helped me to appreciate how difficult it is to make progress in medicine – the amount of work it takes to prove a scientific or medical theory is absolutely mind boggling! My major breakthrough in discovering what I want to do with my career and my life occurred when I had the opportunity to shadow a PA in a surgical setting. I fell completely in love with medical practice the minute I stepped into the OR. The hands-on engineer in me was completely enthralled because I was able to literally look into the human body, see what was going wrong, and watch as the physicians and PA’s fixed the problem. Finally, for my senior design project in Bioengineering, I was able to observe an aortic valve replacement (open heart surgery) from just inches away from the patient’s heart. It was an incredible experience that definitely sealed the deal on choosing my future career.

How has your experience as an EA impacted your professional life so far? My experience as an Engineering Ambassador has been unbelievably helpful in all aspects of my life. It has given me confidence to speak up for myself in general as well as helped me to do well in interviews when applying for PA school. And even now while I’m on clinical rotations, the experience I got while participating in the Engineering Ambassadors program helps me because I spend 90% of my day communicating with people.

I communicate with patients. I have to make them feel comfortable enough to tell me their story. I have to help them understand what they are suffering from and why. I have to talk to them about options for treatment and explain how and why those things (whether it be a prescription, surgery, physical therapy, etc) work.

I also communicate with other providers such as physicians, nurses, and PA’s. The medical world has a very strict format for presenting medical information that can be extremely stressful for students who are just learning how to present a patient to an attending or other practitioner. Very early on in my training, I already felt comfortable presenting patients to large groups of physicians, PA’s and my peers because of my experience as an Engineering Ambassador. It has helped me learn how to quickly organize my thoughts and include all the important, pertinent information people need to know in a very fluid, confident manner.

Engineering Ambassadors has been, and throughout my entire career will continue to be, a huge influence on who I am and how I communicate with my patients and other providers. I already pride myself on my ability to make quick, heart-felt connections with my patients that allow them to talk openly with me, confide in me, and trust me. For these communication skills I learned through Engineering Ambassadors, I will be forever grateful.