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“I want to be a cardiologist, and Camp Cardiac is really helping,” said Alina Khan, an Irving high school student.

She and about two dozen other teenagers from all over the Metroplex have converged on the UNT Health Science Center in Fort Worth to participate in Camp Cardiac. It’s a national program that lets high school kids sample medical school, with an emphasis on the human heart.

The intensive five-day experience mixes classroom learning with hands-on practice and informal question-and-answer sessions with actual medical students. About 14 students from the Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine have devoted rare downtime to help the younger kids understand what they’ll encounter once they get to medical school.

“These high school students are amazing, so eager to become doctors and so academically advanced for their age group,” said Phillip Saperstein, DO, Professor of Family Medicine, as he supervised the teens taking each other’s blood pressure.

“The questions they ask show how deep their learning is,” said Amani Sanchez, second-year TCOM student and Director of Camp Cardiac Fort Worth.  “One of them accurately read an EKG.”

When Alina Khan finished her mock exam of a fellow Camp Cardiac student, she approached the exam room sink. Said TCOM student Lauren Rutter, “Look, we didn’t even tell her to, and she’s washing her hands!”

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