Promoting pathology

A shortage of pathologists can lead to delays in diagnosis of disease, as well as increases in misdiagnoses and medical errors. But the number of residents choosing pathology as a career path has been steadily decreasing over the years, while the need for pathologists has risen with the opioid crisis and COVID-19 pandemic.

“Every time I tell someone I’m interested in pathology, they give me this face, like ‘really?!’” said Frank Cedeno, a third-year student in the NEOMED College of Medicine.

Cedeno hopes to change people’s perceptions of the field of pathology. He is president of the newly re-formed Pathology Interest Group at NEOMED and plans to do what he can to increase students’ exposure to the field.

Cedeno and interest group advisor Jennifer Baccon, M.D., Ph.D., professor of pathology at NEOMED, recently received a $500 grant from the Intersociety Council for Pathology Information (ICPI) to bolster those efforts.

The Margaret Grimes Medical Student Interest Group Grant from ICPI is intended to raise awareness of careers in pathology. Grant recipients will attend a virtual forum this spring to share experiences with other grant recipients and give input to the ICPI Board on how to better serve medical students.

“My goal is to get our students excited about pathology and its different career choices and pathways,” Cedeno said. “And I think this grant will allow me to expand our interest group so that more students can get excited about pathology.”

The grant will help the interest group host a variety events and programs for students.

“We will have talks by pathologists. We’ll bring in students to really see an actual high-tech microscope so they can view histological slides. Or even working alongside someone in a hospital, in order for our students to get exposure to both the anatomical side of pathology as well as the clinical side of pathology,” Cedeno said.

Currently the Pathology Interest Group includes 37 members.

A Passion for Science

Pathology was a logical choice for Cedeno.

“I’ve always really liked medicine,” he said. “But I think even during my high school days, I was more passionate about general science, biology and the more, I guess, intellectually stimulating concepts, say genetics or evolution, as opposed to something more categorical like ecology. I was wondering, what can I do with that kind of interest?

“I think pathology is a field that for those students that really enjoyed their first two years of medical school more than their clinical years,” he added.

He hopes to reach more students who share his interest in the science of medicine.

“I think my objective and my goal is to really give exposure to this field so that students can get excited and to get them thinking ‘hey, you know, maybe this is this is for me,” Cedeno said. “Maybe in the future, when someone asks a student what they want to be and they answer with ‘pathologist,’ it wouldn’t be that surprising.”