Senior Project

So I'm finally done with my senior project. I learned so much from all the research I gathered on autism. I didn't know there was so much to autism but there is and I'm glad I was able to find out all these things. I want to give a huge thank you to my mentor, Dr. Elaine Chen, who will be seeing this post on my blog. Dr. Chen, thank you so much for being a great mentor and always knowing what to say when it came to my questions. I also want to give a huge thank you to Mrs. LaRussa who helped me with my senior project. She made sure I was always on task and constantly asked me if I needed help or had any questions for her to answer. I enjoyed my time during mentorship. I've been volunteering at Sunshine Pediatrics for almost 4 years already and I will continue to volunteer there throughout college.

Preparing For My Final Presentation

Since I'm done researching for my senior project, I decided to make my April blogpost on how I'm preparing myself for my final presentation. I enjoyed researching on my topic, Pediatrics, because it's the career I want to be pursue. At first I didn't know I was going to be doing my essential question on autism. The reason why I decided to go into autism was because of the link people are saying there is between vaccines and the disorder. Researching was awesome because I learned things I didn't know anything about. For example, different vaccines, what some vaccines hold, and the different kinds of PDD's. Autism is a great topic to research and I enjoyed it so much. I could say that I'm ready for my final presentation. I feel organized and excited. I've already talked with my mentor, Dr. Chen, about how I'm going to do it and I'm going to do a mini presentation with my elective teacher and to her class a week before my actual presentation. I really hope it goes as planned. :-)

Asperger's from the Inside Out

I started reading this book less than a month ago and I recently just finished it. It's a great book! Mrs. Yelverton recommended it to me and I'm glad she did. It's written by Michael John Carley. Michael is the founder of the Global and Regional Asperger Syndrome Partnership aka GRASP. GRASP is a support and advocacy group for adults with Asperger Syndrome.

This book doesn't only answer your questions or help provide all the answers but will also provide you with perspective and information. It will also help guide you as you move forward. It's a clear guide for adults with Aspergers.

This book includes a number of useful resources and suggestions. It also includes a variety of stories from a community advocate, Michael John Carley.

Throughout this book you realize that Michael John Carley gave himself the self assurance and social ability he needed to succeed as a New York playwright, husband, parent and entrepreneur.

Coping With Autism

While researching what to have as my third answer I found this youtube video that helps a lot. It has a lot of facts and details on what is the best way to cope if someone has autism. It's a pretty long video with a lot of bullet points but it was fun to watch. I enjoyed it because I learned so much from it and it helped me a lot with my third answer to my essential question. The video is presented by Caroline Moniza who is a family consoler. Below I've posted the link.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZxvdbgJ88c

The Sweden Brothers

This week's research check I found a great and useful article. The article talks about a link that could be a reason of what causes autism. It talks about genetic background from these two brothers who have autism and a mice who had autism and also the gene NLGN3. The two brothers also had the gene NLGN3 and that's why they believe that the brothers received autism because the mice was the first mice to be experimented with autism. I talked about this research on my lesson plan and I'm also writing about it on my additional blog because it's so interesting and something new that could or could not be the cause of autism. Below I will share the link of the article.

http://sfari.org/news-and-opinion/news/2014/genetic-background-may-alter-behavior-of-autism-mice

Dr. Andrew Wakefield

I found this video while researching about my topic. In this video, Dr. Andrew Wakefield is a gastrointestinal surgeon. He also likes to study about vaccines in general. He discovered that autism was linked with the three combination vaccine; which includes, measles, mumps and rubella. They call it the MMR vaccine. Dr. Andrew Wakefield lost his career and name for "following the truth his research led him to." There is absolutely no link between any type of vaccine and autism.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4PeLtH6RWY

Intramuscular and Subcutaneous Injections

During my week of thanksgiving vacation I volunteered at the pediatric clinic that I do my mentorship at. I talked with my mentor, Dr. Chen. She was explaining to me the different types of ways you have to inject a vaccine to a patient. If you are giving a subcutaneous injection, you will inject directly into the fatty tissue; meaning under the skin and overlying the muscle.  If you are giving an intramuscular injection, you will inject directly into the deltoid muscle; meaning below the shoulder on the upper arm. I found these two type of ways very interesting because I knew of no such thing.

Iris Grace

Iris Grace is a five year old girl who was diagnosed with autism at the age of two. She's just starting to talk but she has one of the most beautiful talents anybody has ever seen. Iris can paint! Her art is so amazing that it came out in the newspaper. Her parents were happy and ok with that because it raised awareness of her condition and inspired other families in similar situations. This story was published globally in 207 different countries in the year of 2013.

Your Child's Health

I checked this book out from Cal Poly's library. This so far has been my favorite book that I've read and used for research check. Let me talk a little bit about the author. Barton D. Schmitt is a professor of pediatrics at the University of Colorado, a school of medicine. He's an author of more than 100 articles and books for physicians, nurses, and parents. He wrote this book as a guidance for parents. This book talks about what a parent should do if their child comes across any type of behavior or sickness. Anything possible that a parent could be concerned about is in this book.

Immunizations for Children

On the first week of school, I showed this chart for Show and Tell. This chart shows the vaccines that are recommended for children from birth through 6 years old. Sunshine Pediatrics, the clinic I do my mentorship, has this chart in every room so that the patient's parents can see what their child needs in order to be up to date on their vaccines.

Hepatitis B is the only vaccine babies receive when they are first born. It's recommended that babies receive this vaccine before leaving the hospital after birth.

Pediarix: is a combination of three that include;

• DTaP: Diphtheria 
• HepB: Hepatitis B
• IPV: Polio 

RV: is what they call Rotateq. It's an oral vaccine, meaning it's given through the mouth. Patients are given this vaccine when they're 2, 4 and 6 months.