First Time for Everything

I did it. It finally happened. I officially had my first meeting with Dr. Stokes. I have to admit, in the beginning, I was a ball of nerves. It wasn't because I was afraid or anything, but rather I was just anticipating making a mistake such as cutting her off mid-sentence or asking very dense questions. But the meeting went so so well. Dr. Stokes is such an amazing person to talk to. Not only is she very knowledgeable in her field, but she is also so funny. In our meeting, we talked about various topics. First off we talked about the field of pediatrics as a whole. I even learned that even though pediatricians see children from 0 - 18, it's actually very common for people in college and late twenties to continue to see their pediatricians. I never thought of a 28-year-old still seeing the person who cared for them since they were born. I also learned some other random information. 5 - 10 years ago pediatricians advised parents to take their children off solids, however, this led to an increase in allergies in kids. We also talked about the COVID Vaccine, specifically the Johnson & Johnson vaccine which is an mRNA vaccine. An RNA vaccine or mRNA vaccine is a type of vaccine that uses a copy of a natural chemical called messenger RNA to produce an immune response. Another topic we discussed was how the media has treated COVID. The media has a tendency to exaggerate information, such as the number of deaths in the U.S. The media has compared the number of deaths to the population of Italy, but they failed to emphasize that Italy has a smaller population compared to the U.S. This is just one example of how the media has affected people during the pandemic. The next day after the meeting, I received an email from one of her office administrators asking me to read an article titled “Anti-vaccine activists spark a state’s worst measles outbreak in decades”. I'm very excited to read this and discuss it with Dr. Stokes. All in all, I would say this was a successful meeting and I can't wait to have our next one.