Bone Marrow Transplantation and Stem Cell Biology (Clinical Elective)

4 units

This elective is designed to introduce students to the general inpatient, intensive care, and outpatient management of patients with multiple hematologic malignancies including leukemia, lymphoma, marrow failure states and myeloma. These patients will be treated with chemotherapy, targeted therapies and cellular immunotherapies including chimeric receptor T cells (CART), natural killer cells, bispecific antibody treatments and stem cell transplant (both autologous and allogeneic). As the primary team, the BMT service is responsible for diagnosing and treating all medical problems including many critical care issues that may occur in these patients. These complex patients are often severely immunocompromised, coagulopathic, and at high-risk of multi-organ complications from both their disease and their therapy. Students work closely with residents, fellows, and faculty to develop treatment plans for patients. Students participate in daily rounds discussing general inpatient and intensive care BMT patients and attend outpatient clinic 1 day/wk to see how BMT physicians approach patients faced with difficult decisions to make regarding their care. In addition to multiple weekly conferences, students also attend daily teaching rounds led by faculty to learn the basic science of hematopoiesis, the genomics of leukema, stem cell biology, gene therapy and cell therapy, transplantation immunology, graft vs host disease and infectious diseases seen in these immunocompromised patients. The average medical student will contribute to the care of inpatients (30-40 patients/day) and will be directly involved in the assessment and care of selected outpatients as well.