DALLAS—Blake Pate, a senior at Dallas Baptist University spent his summer learning at a campus far from home, working as an intern at Yale School of Medicine.
Pate interned with Dr. Carlos Oliveira, a DBU alumnus and Yale affiliate, working on research regarding the effectiveness of the HPV vaccine.
Since the project specifically concerned infectious disease, Pate noted principles and terminology he learned in a microbiology class Debra Henson taught at DBU provided valuable preparation for his internship. Likewise, he said, a statistics class Dion Fleitas taught prepared him for the various types of data analysis and hypothesis testing researchers used.
“During my internship, I was primarily doing biostatistical research,” Pate explained. “When I was not doing research, I was either attending clinical conferences where physicians presented recent peculiar cases or I was shadowing physicians at Yale New Haven Hospital with either the infectious disease team or the trauma team.”
When Pate completes his undergraduate studies at DBU, he hopes to enter medical school to pursue a surgical specialty. He offered appreciation to Oliveira for the opportunity to grow academically and spiritually.
“Dr. Oliveira and his wife are both physicians in the Yale network, and they both sought to provide me the best experience this summer that they possibly could,” Pate said. “They not only taught me much about medicine and academia, but also what it means to pursue the cross of Jesus Christ wholeheartedly. I have been humbled by their work ethic and blessed by their generosity.”
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