april 29, 2024: a week in the life

this week

I MADE MY FIRST POSTER PRESENTATION! On Monday, I stood (and sat) for around 2.5 hours in a downstairs meeting room of my office building while clinical staff and a few patient representatives perused the research on display. I had some insightful discussions with the attendees, some of whom were current or former donors and others of whom had experience with venipunctures in clinic. There’s much to learn from colleagues who see patients “on the ground” - that’s something I’ll try to remember in my three(-ish)-year-long odyssey analysing data from very healthy people.

For the rest of the week, I presented findings from my primary analysis to research unit colleagues, who were simultaneously lovely and full of grilling questions (which I enjoyed trying to respond to). That presentation has already informed how I communicate my results in writing! I also discovered in the middle of the week that I had made an incorrect assumption about my data and therefore re-ran 90% of my primary analyses, which turned out to be less of a hassle than I thought. I’m glad I caught that in the early stages … Also, as part of my constant search for new research directions, I began learning more about causal inference methods like Mendelian randomisation, which takes advantage of the “randomisation” that occurs in everyone’s genetic code at birth to answer questions about causal relations between diverse exposures and health outcomes.

next week

Continuing with my journey to become more knowledgeable about causal inference, I’ll be taking an online course on the subject from some experts at my alma mater, UCL, on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. In between, I hope I’ll squeeze in some brainstorming about how to use those methods in further work, as well as writing and re-writing my interpretations of my primary data analysis to make them more understandable to readers.

outside the lab

I took a train to London on Friday, expecting to attend an eagerly-awaited concert by Sleeping at Last, but had a last-minute change of plans … more details to come!

on the reading list

Reljin N, Zimmer G, Malyuta Y, Shelley K, Mendelson Y, Blehar DJ, Darling CE, Chon KH. Using support vector machines on photoplethysmographic signals to discriminate between hypovolemia and euvolemia. PLoS One. 2018 Mar 29;13(3):e0195087.

weekly photo

A Friday feast at the Indian YMCA student hostel in Fitzrovia, London. Something like sambar (not an expert, sorry!), khichdi, chicken in a warming gravy, roti, and rice.

about me

I’m Yaning (she/her), a PhD candidate in Public Health and Primary Care at the University of Cambridge. I am working with colleagues in the Blood and Transplant Research Unit, the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit, and NHS Blood and Transplant (England’s national blood service) to improve the safety and efficiency of voluntary whole blood donation. I’m supervised by the amazing Dr Lois Kim and funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research. This is my blog about my journey through this candidature, starting from nine months before my transfer of status. Please feel free to reach out at yw645 [at] cam [dot] ac [dot] uk!