TOLEDO - Learning about medical tools, visiting a cadaver laboratory and attempting to diagnose illnesses were just a few of the activities students who went to CampMed participated in about two weeks ago.
Alexander Beleny and Collin Shaver, freshmen at Hopewell-Loudon High School; Jaden Stahl, a freshman at St. Wendelin High School; and Breanna Wetzel, Jordan Heabler and Karly Rupert, freshmen at Clyde High School, were among 36 students who participated in the 14th annual CampMed program June 16-17 at University of Toledo's health science campus.
According to a University of Toledo release, the schedule included a tools session for students to learn how to use blood pressure cuffs and stethoscopes. The program also included learning about plastination, viewing a medical helicopter and making wrist casts.
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Beleny
Beleny said a science teacher told him about CampMed, and his brother had a good experience when he participated in the program. He said he had been thinking about going since his brother went two years ago.
"I was hoping that it would decide my path in medicine," he said.
Students had to fill out an application and write an essay during the selection process. Beleny said he was excited and happy he was selected.
"I couldn't wait to go," he said.
Beleny said CampMed participants learned about tools, such as a stethoscope, photo scope and reflex hammer, and saw three-dimensional photographs of lungs and other body parts. Officials showed them what medical personnel need to wear when they perform surgery, how patients are strapped to a board, how to make arm, finger, head and knee splints and how to wrap body parts.
CampMed participants went to a radiology room to learn about X-rays, CT scans and MRIs and went to a cadaver laboratory.
"They showed us all the different organs of cadavers," Beleny said.
Beleny, who plans to study medicine, said he learned a lot from CampMed. He said officials talked about how people on the road to medical school don't have to have a major or minor having anything to do with medicine and could major in business. He said he always thought a student had to study anatomy, biology or a similar subject.
CampMed was educational, but officials made it fun so students didn't mind learning, he said.
"It was interesting," he said.
Stahl, a Findlay resident, said she didn't know Beleny before participating in CampMed, and they've become close friends.
She said she has been wanting to enter the medical center for a long time. Her science teacher showed her and her classmates information about the program, and her mother said it would be a great opportunity.
"It was worth (going)," she said.
Stahl said she is hoping to work in pediatric diagnostics.
"It's the people who determine whether (children) have (an illness) or not," she said.
