Genetics Clinic in Scottsbluff

This past weekend the two other summer interns (Katie and Carl) and I traveled to Scottsbluff, Nebraska for a genetics outreach clinic. We were in the car for 8 hours each way, allowing me to see the entire state of Nebraska! Fun at first, then got a little redundant. It was very flat and you could see for miles. Here are some pics from the drive:

We observed the clinic all day on Friday and Saturday. I didn't have any idea of what to expect, and was thinking it would be more of a lab setting. It turns out that it was a very interdisciplinary clinic where parents/kids could come to get a lot of information at one time. So instead of making separate appointments with a geneticist, psychologist, nurse, doctor, physical therapist, occupational therapist, etc., a family could get them all out of the way at once. It was a great way to do things, and I hope that one day I work in a setting like that. These were not super long appointments, but acted more as screenings. Recommendations were given to parents after the sessions. For example, if a child showed physical/developmental signs of fragile x syndrome, the geneticist would set up an appointment for the child to be genetically tested, while the psychologist would set up an appointment for a psychoeducational evaluation as well as give recommendations for managing behavior. Many of the kids in the clinic actually came with foster parents and were being evaluated because of possible exposure to drugs/alcohol during pregnancy. If there were signs of these exposures, the doctor would write a note to the court system to establish a pre-existing condition so that medicare would cover these children later in life. If anything was reiterated to me on the trip, it was how much respect and admiration that I have for foster parents. I met so many truly selfless people.

After finishing with the clinic we decided to climb Scott's Bluff, which actually turned into driving to the top and walking around a little :) It was beautiful, though, and very different from the rest of the landscape in Nebraska. Here are some pics...

All in all it was an awesome trip :)