We’re delighted to share our newest interview about attendee experiences at global immunology meetings. We are honored to provide grants to support travel to essential immunology conferences as part of our WINMD program.
Olivia Starich, currently a medical student, received a WINMD grant to support her attendance at the Clinical Society for Immunology (CIS) meeting. We hope you enjoy reading about her experience!
- Please share a brief overview of your career and current work. What made you interested in immunology?
Immunology was a bit of a “sleeper topic” for me in medical school — I really didn’t anticipate it gripping me quite like it did! Despite all of the detail and complexity involved in the different facets of our immune systems, I was really floored by (and quickly became enamored with!) the intricacy and elegance of the human immune response and all of the minute yet important ways that the scales can be tipped such that there is no immune response or an overwhelming and disproportionate one. While I’m ultimately planning to apply into general surgery residencies, I’ve kept a keen eye on transplant surgery/medicine as an avenue of interest, primarily because of the interplay between inherently large-scale, high-risk surgeries and the added complexity that comes with modulating a patient’s immune response after a successful procedure.
- Why did you want to attend CIS?
The Clinical Immunology Society’s annual meeting was a terrific chance to not only present my own research (which is always tremendously exciting!) on laboratory criteria in diagnosing CVID, but also to meet with scientists and clinicians whose work I’ve been studying and learn about some of the up-and-coming changes and discoveries in the field.
- What was your biggest takeaway from attending CIS?
The “Tales from the Listserv” session was a great surprise for me - previous conferences I’ve attended haven’t had anything like that session, and it was very neat (and fun!) to hear how a global network of clinicians and scientists would come together via email to help colleagues and friends with tricky questions related to patient workup, diagnosis, and management. In medical school, we quickly learn that consulting other services or colleagues at the hospital or in the department is commonplace, but it was awe-inspiring to learn how wide the web of support can be and how many great minds can be tapped to answer a question!
- How will you take what you learned at the CIS conference and apply it to your daily work?
I’m still in school and have very little idea of what my daily work will look like; that said, the enthusiasm for collaboration and helping others around the world — whether peers, colleagues, or learners who are just dipping their toes into the water — is something I think would be valuable in any field, and something I feel pretty passionate about. A friend once phrased it as “not shutting the door behind you,” and that really resonated with me; academia in general can be pretty bad about exclusive emphasis on individual accolades, and it’s worth recognizing that if the incredible amount of learning and research that goes on around the world every day were to be siloed away for personal glory, there would be far less by way of innovation and improvement to many aspects of our personal and professional lives!
- Is there a specific research effort or development in the field of immunology that you’re particularly excited about?
Thymus transplantation was a completely unfamiliar concept to me prior to attending CIS, so reading up on how indications and practices are continuing to change and develop has been really fascinating to me!
- Do you have any advice for first-time conference attendees?
Look at the program in advance to get an idea of what sorts of talks you’re interested in going to so that you have an idea of where you will need to be and when (especially if it’s a larger conference where multiple sessions run at the same time). Don’t be afraid to strike up conversation with folks — ask questions, offer to grab coffee between talks, and really immerse yourself in it. At the same time, don’t be afraid to have fun! Sometimes the days are incredibly heavy and academically dense, and it’s tough to stay in that mode for multiple days in a row. If you’re able, make a little time to venture out into the host city, try a neat restaurant, see the sights, and do something a little touristy while you’re there — you never know when (or if) you’ll be back, or if you’ll have that same ability to explore in the future.
- What is the most rewarding aspect of your career?
Once again, I’m not sure what will come of the rest of my career and how my values and responsibilities will be flavored by this down the road, but I will say that I absolutely love learning from patients and their families — there are some things that can’t be taught in a classroom, and I would argue that the quirks, hobbies, and stories that make us human are part of that, especially when they’re not purely medical in focus.
- Is there anything else you’d like to share with our community?
It’s worth remembering that while this field covers everything from minor-but-annoying allergies to sometimes devastating constellations of disease, immunodeficiencies are relatively rare in the grand scheme of things. Consequently, the support and funding for those of us who study them is also relatively limited. Grants like those offered by JMF can make a tremendous difference when it comes to getting one’s foot in the door, attending a first conference, or meeting the people who might make the most difference for an aspiring clinician/scientist early in their career — particularly when the cost of travel becomes a factor. Gratitude for JMF’s support doesn’t even begin to cover how I feel, and I’m looking forward to the day where I can help others who might find themselves in similar shoes!