Starting my ‘dissertation’

So the last two weeks have been superrrrr busy, and filled with lots of new challenges and adventures. Being in my final year and final semester of Biomed at Newcastle means that I am well into ‘dissertation’ semester. While for us we are not officially writing a dissertation and instead completing a research project which we will write a ‘paper’ on, it’s kinda the same thing.

We are given a question or topic to which we create our own question, and have 10 weeks to attempt to answer/prove/disprove this. This is either done in the form of a lab experiment or by carrying out statistical analysis/research (the latter of which is what I am doing). 8 of the weeks we have to find the data and complete the experiments/studies and the final 2 weeks are solely for writing it all up ready to hand in (ooooh scary).

Up to now, I am loving every aspect of what my project entails. I get to look at congenital heart disease in adults, which for anyone that knows me is of major interest to me and a field of medicine which I would LOVE to go into one day, be in the hospital learning from the best in their field and do tons of research which is the side of Biomed I really enjoy. For me, I get the best of both worlds.

This semester is full of new oportunities and one which I think I can say is my favourite of all the semesters, but it is also quite a sad one – we don’t get to see our course friends nearly half as much as we would like and it’s the final semester ever of this degree which is obviously sad to have to say.

Being able to look back on the degree and forward to what this ‘dissertation’ will teach me, it is safe to say that I am beyond lucky for the way my life turned out and if I had to go back and do it all again I would not change a thing.

For anyone thinking Biomed as a step into medicine or as their aspiration in life, I highly recommend it, and Newcastle. I have learnt so much, not just academically but about myself too and grown more as a person than I ever thought imaginable.

What an amazing 3 years it has been so far!

H. x