Story of Xueqing (Ana) Wang
I am second-year PhD student in the area of basic medicine. My father is a clinician specializing in oncology surgery. I have been listening to his stories since childhood. He told me stories about what happened in the hospital, such as the treatment of very sick patients, the handling of emergencies in operation, and the communication with family members of patients. The most memorable thing is that one day, while the family was having dinner, I accidentally found that Dad’s glasses had stains on the frame. He picked them up and found that it was blood. He accidentally stained his glasses during an emergency operation. He was worried that I would be scared by the blood stain because I was still young at that time. However, I didn’t feel repelled, I wanted to know the details of the operation. I was very interested in medicine, but this interest was very vague. I really determined my profession at the time when I chose my learning area after college entrance examination. Seeing a thick list of colleges and universities, I found that I only want to choose those institutions that offered medical science. However, my family worried that the clinician’s work was too hard. After discussion, I applied for a basic medical major and planned to engage in basic medical research.
During my undergraduate studies, I mainly studied theoretical foundations, including cell biology, microbiology, molecular biology, and genetics. Every day, a lot of knowledge needed to be understood and memorized by me. Medical students’ academic workload was heavy, but I have been such a student who was able to take the heavy workload since I was a child. I didn’t feel very bored, and I enjoyed rich experimental classes combined with practical operations. At the time, although I was still not sure whether I would be engaged in this professional-related work for the rest of my life, I was sure that I was comfortable with this learning mode.
I was studying the seven-year undergraduate medical program, which was that I didn’t need to pass the postgraduate entrance exam and could go directly to the master’s degree after my four-year undergraduate course. It was also after my four-year undergraduate study that I confirmed my preference for medical science.
During my master’s degree, I chose microbiology. My tutor was a very easy-going, but serious professor. My research team leader who taught me to conduct experiments had very clear research ideas and she was also very patient in teaching me to do research. In addition, the university had a newly renovated experimental building. Both the facilities and the human environment of the University were very friendly. In such an atmosphere, I quickly mastered the common experimental methods. I thought that the process of reading the literature, conceiving research directions, discussing with the tutor and the teacher, conducting experiments and analyzing the results were all very interesting. Although it is very hard for me to get up early in the morning and stay up late at night, and my research often got into a bottleneck, the satisfaction of achieving good experimental results after overcoming difficulties, is something I had never felt before.
During my master’s degree, my performance was relatively good. With the help of my tutor, I got in touch with my current Supervisor, I applied for and obtained scholarship support from the China Scholarship Council. I went to Australia to study for my doctoral degree. When I was in college, I didn’t think that I could study abroad one day. There were a lot of resources for students of basic medicine to study abroad. They would make achievements as long as they worked hard.
At present, I have already written two articles, one is the process of submission. It is very pleasant and satisfying to sort out the results of the experiments, draft them, and submit them to journals.
My plan for the next two years is to write articles and learn knowledge and skills as much as possible during my PhD period. My long-term plan for the future is to get a job in the basic medical school of a university or a relevant life science research institute, and continue to engage in experimental research. I also want to do part-time teaching job to share as much as possible what I have learned over the years.
I really appreciate you giving this precious opportunity to us, and wish the best for the project.
Best regards,
Xueqing (Ana) Wang BM MMed PhD candidate
School of Medical and Health Sciences
Edith Cowan University
270 Joondalup Drive, Joondalup, WA 6027
Tel: 0401954620
