Mo Al-Khalaf, PhD – Page 3 – The Early Career Voice

A New Year and A New Perspective on Mentorship!

January 7, 2020January 7, 2020 Mo Al-Khalaf, PhD

At every stage of personal growth and development, mentors play a key role in providing advice and support to propel their mentees forward. The act of mentorship is a core element of social interactions and societal advancement. A line like “it takes a village to raise a child” is basically talking about mentorship. Same for the commonly used line in academic and medical circles – “See one. Do one. Teach one.” Graduate and postgraduate students and fellows are required to have assigned mentors to guide them through their final stages of education, and early stages of a professional career.

The level of success a person achieves can be accurately traced to the level of mentorship afforded to them. Mentorship, more so than just academic education, provides a broad spectrum of opportunities for learning and growth. Great mentors are able to provide advancement in what is classically referred to as “soft skills”. These are skills like: communication, leadership, time management, “tricks of the trade”, and other avenues of growth normally left out of school curriculums. This makes finding a highly qualified and experienced mentor an extremely valuable endeavor. Of course these skills are not limited to the medical and academic fields; mentorship is valuable in all aspects of personal and professional growth.

Here is where I introduce the main message I’d like to pass along in this piece. We (correctly) seek and value mentorship from experienced, highly qualified, and revered individuals, to assist us in advancing our knowledge and skills within our chosen fields. However by focusing on finding one type of mentor, we may be setting ourselves up for lost opportunities, learning and advancements of equally beneficial value, from individuals that don’t fit the classic idea of a mentor. By this I mean, when was the last time you looked for a mentor that was junior to you?

We all are kind of aware of how this type of mentorship can be, like how I’m happy to continuously coach my dad on how to advance his usage of smart phone technology, and how my younger relative is mentoring me on how to be a better skater and hockey player! This same kind of mentorship dynamic can also translate in a professional/academic setting. In our present fast-paced advancing world, many novel ideas and tools develop, and typically the earliest adopters are not individuals that have established some previously learned and used idea/tool (i.e. the ones with the lived-in world “experience”). Most of the time, early adopters are typically young, enthusiastic, quick learners!

This group has shown time and again, when it comes to the newest forms of knowledge and skills, they’re ahead of the archetypal mentor. Seeking and accepting younger mentors, in addition to classic mentors, allows the mentee to gain knowledge and skills in a wide range of topics and fields, as opposed to only seeking top-down knowledge. There is great value in learning from experienced individuals, but there is also value gained by seeking the expertise of younger enthusiastic early adopters of novelty, regardless of what field one is pursing mentorship in.

(Image collage sourced from pixabay.com)

Considering this is the time in the calendar where everyone is reflecting on the accomplishments of the past, and making plans and resolutions for the coming year, I thought I would suggest an additional resolution to add to your list this time around. In an effort to maximize personal and professional growth, why not make a resolution centered on mentorship? I’ll even create a fun plot device J What if the resolution could be formulated as follows: This year I will seek (or continue to benefit from) one mentor that is “double” my age/experience AND one mentor that is “half” my age/experience (let’s call it the Double & a Half Mentorship rule!). *All values are approximate.

I’ll use myself for an example: as an early career scientist, a mentor “double” my age is already in place (that’s my boss, Chief Science Officer of the Institute I work in, and Senior Principal Investigator on the research group I’m part of; who truthfully has way more energy than I can achieve, proving that age is not a good measure for vitality!). A mentor “half” my age would be a summer/undergraduate student or temporary employee in our research group (again, the age part of the rule is approximate); someone that will teach me a skill in the lab or on a computer, that will promote my professional goal of learning and conducting high caliber research in cardiovascular disease areas.

This year I aim to continue finding ways to learn and gain skills from both an experienced mentor, and a young enthusiastic mentor, to advance my personal and professional development. I hope you maximize your mentorship opportunities as well. Happy New Year!

How to Ensure Accurate Public Communication and Information Sharing

November 25, 2019November 26, 2019 Mo Al-Khalaf, PhD

Public communication and knowledge dissemination are often thought of as straight cut, on/off types of action, especially in medicine and the broader health sciences. However it is also very evident in our present day that miscommunication and inaccurate knowledge sharing exists, and has increasingly harmful consequences on the global population. Examples of this are plenty, such as the anti-vaccination movement, the numerous debates about food health categorization, novel diet constructions, and many others.

This year in Philadelphia, where the annual AHA meeting (#AHA19) was hosted, many relevant hot topics in medicine and healthcare were spotlighted, as is usually the case in these types of marquee events. The sense coming out of the meeting was that two major issues of discussion will have to be reckoned with:

The strong AHA call to action against the E-cigarette proliferating market, specifically in the way it targets youth and minority groups;
The global trial called ISCHEMIA (International Study of Comparative Health Effectiveness With Medical and Invasive Approaches), with its top-line statement that there was no difference between interventionist and conservative therapies for patients diagnosed with stable ischemic heart disease.

Debates quickly flared, and the messages became misunderstood and controversial. These provide a real life test once again, on how we must optimize public communication and knowledge dissemination.

At #AHA19, the start of the #QuitLying campaign against the forces driving the steep increase in youth consumption of nicotine-containing vaping products, has garnered welcome applause and support by numerous school boards, concerned parents, and health conscious youths, former users of e-cigarettes or not. These groups are well aware of the high prevalence of use (more than 1 in 4 adolescents self report¹as e-cigarette users within the past 30 days, in 2019). Everyone is genuinely concerned about the ramifications if nothing is done. This is why the AHA has stepped up with the #QuitLying initiative to combat against the big industry players that drive the majority of the proliferation of these products within youth culture.

However when the message and information being distributed is counteracted by other sources that aim to mislead and obscure facts, public communication and knowledge sharing becomes much more convoluted and disrupted. Everyone has the right to voice their opinion, that’s not in question, and there is no way to avoid lies and deceptive facts from being shared. But there are new tools to clarify, and focus-deliver facts and evidence-based information to the public that deserves the highest quality data and analysis available to it.

The ISCHEMIA trial debate is another #AHA19 event that requires some clarification and focused-delivery of facts to the public. Some specific details of the trial are nicely outlined by my colleagues Dr. Renee Bullock-Palmer² and Dr. Adham Karim³, and the primary medical publications from the NIH database are available⁴ for review by whomever is interested in the full datasets from the sources. The issues I’m addressing here are not with the trial itself, but the resulting real world consequences that form after the debate from ISCHEMIA gets filtered thru multiple gateways, many well-meaning reporters, and some opinion dispensers that lean one way or another regarding the results of the trial.

ischemia trial

When public communication and knowledge dissemination is unidirectional and gated, patients can become misinformed and fueled with distrust towards the working relationships they have with their healthcare providers (doctors, nurses, surgeons, medical professionals and hospitals). This can lead to compromised decision making, and potentially harmful health outcomes. Optimizing communication and focused-delivery of evidence-based information are essential goals in our present day world, especially between the medical research and healthcare field, and the general public being served.

For many decades, from the initial beginnings of professional journalism and news reporting, up to the start of the new millennium, the available and universally accepted method of public communication and knowledge dissemination was a unidirectional pathway: researchers that perform primary data generation and analysis → reporting and communication by well established, reliable and accountable organizations → the public learning of new information that relates to their health and well-being. That being said, presently communication methods are not confined to the same gated, unidirectional path necessarily. The value of professionals in news reporting and communication is still high, and their existence is an asset and a necessity, especially in situations where communication has to be as widespread as possible in as short a time as is necessary. However, we need to encourage, promote, and build pathways that facilitate communication between the primary sources of data, and the general public, so that accuracy and integrity of the information is maintained, and trust is strengthened between all.

Everyone gains when public communication and knowledge dissemination is accurately spread, and trust is established and elevated when stakeholders are not walled off, so that they can be reachable and communicated with. Social media platforms, professional avenues to connect researchers to the public (like this one! The Early Career Voice) are pathways that can and should be used and widely encouraged, mainly as an effort to create a new model of communication that will reduce inaccuracy of information, increase the sense of trust between the public and those who serve it, and help us all lead a healthier life.

References:

Miech, Richard, et al. “Trends in adolescent vaping, 2017–2019.” New England Journal of Medicine15 (2019): 1490-1491.
Bullock-Palmer, Renee, MD, “My Top 10 Take Home Points from The ISCHEMIA Trial”, The Early Career Voice, November 18, 2019; (Page Link Here)
Karim, Adham, MD, “A Few Things the Critical Care Cardiologist Might Have Missed While Talking About the #ISCHEMIA Trial”, The Early Career Voice, November 18, 2019; (Page Link Here)
ClinicalTrials identifier: NCT01471522; NIH U.S. National Library of Medicine; (Link)

The views, opinions and positions expressed within this blog are those of the author(s) alone and do not represent those of the American Heart Association. The accuracy, completeness and validity of any statements made within this article are not guaranteed. We accept no liability for any errors, omissions or representations. The copyright of this content belongs to the author and any liability with regards to infringement of intellectual property rights remains with them. The Early Career Voice blog is not intended to provide medical advice or treatment. Only your healthcare provider can provide that. The American Heart Association recommends that you consult your healthcare provider regarding your personal health matters. If you think you are having a heart attack, stroke or another emergency, please call 911 immediately.

Being In The Room Where Science Happens

November 16, 2019November 26, 2019 Mo Al-Khalaf, PhD

One of the most important functions of professional meetings, such as AHA Scientific Sessions presently here in Philadelphia, is the ability to bring together trail-blazers, leaders, senior distinguished folks, and put them in the same rooms as students, trainees, and early career professionals. These are the types of interactions that pollinate and spread knowledge, propel further discovery, promote and encourage generation after generation of scientists, doctors, healthcare professionals into carrying the torch further towards a healthier longer life for all.

It is of course of no surprise that the AHA Scientific Sessions meeting is one that attracts the participation of accomplished researchers to come and share their research insights, accumulated wisdom, and give a hint or two about what to do (or what to avoid, from first-hand knowledge perspective). In my personal career field, there are probably no names that come above Dr. Eric Olson in terms of status within the area of research. My former PhD supervisor holds Dr. Olson as a personal role model and mentor, and has mentioned his name countless times during my 5 years of training in his lab. In fact Eric Olson has been referred to in terms closer to a deity than just a scientist. While I’ve never met him, I knew all about him and a lot about his research, he’s the equivalent to a celebrity the likes of Will Smith or Julia Roberts, or at least that’s the best analogy I could make for this scenario.

Being here at AHA19 however has given me the chance to meet Dr. Olson finally, and just as I have heard countless times before, Eric is a humble and impressive scientist, approachable by anyone, since I just walked up to him without advance notice, introduced myself to him mere minutes from his scheduled lecture in the Science Catalyst Keynote session. His down to earth attitude and ability to engage with an unfamiliar early career scientist are reminders that the best, most distinguished researchers are not elitist, discriminating or unapproachable, but in fact are bridge-builders, promoters and seekers of knowledge, everywhere, and by and from everyone that has knowledge to share or seek out.

While Dr. Olson is an excellent example, he is by no means a unique case. Conferences and professional meetings, happening everywhere across the world, all provide chances like this one, where knowledge seekers and knowledge providers congregate in rooms to share, discuss and plan, so that most times everyone leaves these rooms more educated and enlightened, than when they first walked in. Here in Philadelphia this weekend, one of the mottos on everyone’s tongue, surely because we are provided a special performance from the hit play Hamilton is “Be in The Room,” which references the American nation building efforts done by the US constitution founders. Here I conclude by extending this motto into present day health and biomedical research, by saying to all, try if you can, and be in the rooms where science happens!

A Framework for Going to Professional Conferences & Meetings

November 11, 2019November 26, 2019 Mo Al-Khalaf, PhD

During my graduate education years, my understanding and focus on attending conferences was almost exclusively centered on two priorities:

Learning about the science happening in my area of interest, and the surrounding research that can complement and elevate my present projects.
Being able to participate (via poster or a short talk) and deliver a useful and potentially distinguished presentation at the conference.

This is pretty much the default priority list for any grad student – not just in biomedical science, but this accurately applies to all academic fields. In fact I’d argue these are basically all that’s needed and required by students being exposed to academic conferences. Professional meeting events come with relatively steep learning curves when students are first experiencing them. Major conferences are (mostly, but not always) held in cities/towns that attendees don’t reside in, so the difficulty of housing, scheduling food, sleep and even clothing choices all come into play.

Unfamiliar surroundings and temporary changes in daily rhythms can lead to elevated stress levels; an effect called allostatic¹ load, with measurable biological changes previously reported², like elevated cortisol and Interlukin-1β levels measured from human salivary samples. Packed conferences potentially strain mental and emotional health, with the cognitive (over)loading that comes from the equivalent of attending a dozen classes (sessions) back-to-back, then doing it all over again the next day and so on, depending on how long the conference is.

These conference days are as demanding as can be, especially for the lesser experienced graduate students. Thankfully, none of what is mentioned here is presently unknown, denied, or ignored. These days enough writing³ exists, reporting all of these observations, sometimes in scientifically quantifiable⁴ and systematically assessed⁵ studies. Efforts towards counteracting these difficulties are now discussed, advised, and hopefully even the most ambitious and keen grad students are finding ways to mitigate and avoid negative experiences. Being a scientist in the cardiovascular field, I’ll emphasize two quick notes, extremely obvious, but worth highlighting whenever possible:

Physical endurance is an undervalued factor in conference attendance, a lot of calories are getting burned moving from session to session, participating in posters/presentations, meeting people and asking questions – so it’s vital to learn, mind and strategize your conference attendance to best fit your physical endurance status
What you eat matters (always!) and will affect every aspect of your time at the conference (too much/not enough coffee, too much/too little food intake during the conference, healthy vs. unhealthy available options), so again mind and strategize the food/drink variables as part of the overall conference equation.

With repetition and understanding of the general framework of conference proceedings, many of the initial difficulties and trip-ups become learned experiences, allowing attendees to become more comfortable and capable navigators of these unusual few days. This could and does happen sometimes in later grad-school years (senior PhD students, for example), but I’ll focus on the category of attendees that I myself now have become part of the early career professionals and AHA Early Career Blogger. Being in my third year of a postdoctoral fellowship in biomedical research, I’ve been to enough conferences to have a sense of the invisible “skeleton” of conferences. I can identify where the differences between various conferences exist, and where the similarities lie. I’ve learned to gauge how to pack for conferences (if at all possible, avoid checking in luggage! Pack clothing that best represents your professional ambitions. Comfortable shoes are a life saver!), how to navigate the sessions, what to eat and what to avoid. Of course there is no set formula to any of this, trial and error is the most used approach, and sharing experiences can be beneficial (at least that’s my hope in writing this piece!).

I’ll also highlight that for early career professionals, additional priorities/requirements emerge to be added to the original grad-school stage list of goals (namely: learning new information in the field, and fulfilling the level of participation duties offered when registering for the event, like poster or slide presentations). These new aspects are:

Networking, which I’ll define here as establishing professional lines of communication that can be of benefit in building, and maintaining relationships with others to advance professional goals. This is a valuable advanced priority in conference attendance, but I do want to emphasize that it shouldn’t be a requirement within the early stages of conference participation, since at the beginning, conferences can be overwhelming without the additional stress of having to do expert-level professional socializing!
The newest emerging priority I’ve added to my conference attendance efforts is discovering new elements, sufficiently outside the main field you’re involved in, that can enhance and elevate work/career forward. What I mean by that, being a biomedical research scientist, is seeking sessions in the program that address topics not directly related to: Heart Failure, genomic stability, inflammation, and similar keywords that relate to research my group and I work on. The new elements for me include things like: science communication, social media engagement, scientific advocacy, linking scientists to policy makers; and many other examples of topics that exist around health and scientific research but are not necessarily done in a lab or hospital setting.

Conferences, professional meetings, symposiums, and all types of organized events that occur within professional settings are designed to deliver a large impact to the attendees in a short period of time. Maximizing an individual’s professional development from these settings is key, understanding how to do so requires planning, optimization and gained experience from multiple trials. As with everything else in life, it takes one step at a time.

References:

McEwen, Bruce S., and Ilia N. Karatsoreos. “Sleep deprivation and circadian disruption: stress, allostasis, and allostatic load.” Sleep medicine clinics1 (2015): 1-10.
Auer, Brandon J., et al. “Communication and social interaction anxiety enhance interleukin-1 beta and cortisol reactivity during high-stakes public speaking.” Psychoneuroendocrinology94 (2018): 83-90.
Elfering, Achim, and Simone Grebner. “Getting used to academic public speaking: Global self-esteem predicts habituation in blood pressure response to repeated thesis presentations.” Applied psychophysiology and biofeedback2 (2012): 109-120.
Lü, Wei, et al. “Extraversion and cardiovascular responses to recurrent social stress: effect of stress intensity.” International Journal of Psychophysiology131 (2018): 144-151.
Ebrahimi, Omid Vakili, et al. “Psychological interventions for the Fear of Public Speaking: a Meta-analysis.” Frontiers in Psychology10 (2019): 488.

Acknowledgement:

Extended gratitude goes to the University of Ottawa Heart Institute Librarian: Sarah Visintini, MLIS for assistance in compiling primary material sources in this article. Twitter @SVisin