3/4/16

             Today I met with Dr. Nguyen around 1:00 pm, with no idea what we'd be doing- but, he told me to wear my scrubs. I didn't end up using them to enter the OR or anything, which is good because I wanted to dedicate this blog post to our project. Things worked out! After luckily running into Dr. Nguyen in the hallways of the cardiovascular ICU on the 8th floor, I went with him to go deal with a patient's incision drainage- not the best thing to see after lunch. A few sutures later, we were on our way to his office for a short meeting about the project. I went over what "the project" is in my Feb. 12th blog post, but I'll review it again here: it's the seed for a greater effort to introduce layman audiences to complicated heart diseases, and uses simple animation as a means of conveying information. I've been thinking of naming it "(insert heart condition):What's Going On?," but that's tentative. We've crafted a story around it, and will be using that story to bring in viewership and ensure a degree of entertainment. Length-wise, it's aimed at around five minutes; keeping it short is part of the accessibility. People are busy, and if they have a loved one dealing with a heart condition, they won't want to sit down for a thirty-minute lecture on the intricacies of that condition. They need the basics, and that's exactly what we hope to deliver.

        The first animation we're working on is about aortic stenosis, the tightening of the aortic valve. The animation has been through a full storyboard draft, and the topic of discussion today was how we'd be moving forward with it. We both decided that pushing it through another draft would be necessary, as refined work is what we both want to see- from the visuals to the dialogue. Dr. Nguyen revealed a potential TV opportunity for it in the near future, which, if used, could really get the entire project on its feet. I'm hopeful that connections can be made through that opportunity, but first we've got to create something that's polished and worth people's time. Saying this makes me sound like a stereotypical teenager, but there are some holes to be filled in Memorial Hermann's social media presence. Their Youtube channel is full of anecdotal cases and recovery stories, which- while impactful- don't deliver overarching information. Every case is different, and although they might give prospective patients something to identify with, it's not contributing to their education about diseases. I definitely appreciate Memorial Hermann's efforts there, but it's just a source of encouraging entertainment. Pulling through with a decent idea about heart disease education is a service not just to future patients, but to the hospital's standing in the tech-savvy world we live in. People want to learn, and with the internet making it easier than ever, What's Going On? has incredible potential.