Hospitals

First Lady hosts health and science celebrities at State of the Union address

off I go to Congress for #SOTU ! I have to leave phone w mom. talk later! incredibly excited! — jack andraka (@jackandraka) Feb. 13, 2013 Smart folks in healthcare, technology and science were the geek stars of Tuesday’s State of the Union address. First Lady Michelle Obama had a jet propulsion engineer from NASA, […]

By Veronica Combs on February 13, 2013 1:27 am

Smart folks in healthcare, technology and science were the geek stars of Tuesday’s State of the Union address.

First Lady Michelle Obama had a jet propulsion engineer from NASA, a heroic New York City nurse, 16-year-old inventor of a new prostate cancer test and the founder of iTriage in her box.

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The health and science celebrities included:

    • Menchu de Luna Sanchez, a registered nurse at NYU Langone Medical Center, devised a plan to transport 20 at-risk infants to intensive care units around the city when the hospital lost power during Hurricane Sandy. de Luna Sanchez was born, reared and educated in the Philippines; she immigrated to the United States in the 1980s. She has worked as a nurse in New York for more than 25 years.

 

    • Jack Andraka won the 2012 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair for his new test for pancreatic cancer. He created a dip-stick sensor based on diabetic test paper to test blood or urine to detect early stage pancreatic cancer. His study resulted in over 90 percent accuracy and showed his patent-pending sensor to be faster, less expensive and more sensitive than current tests.
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    • Bobak Ferdowsi, aka NASA’s “Mohawk Guy,” is a member of the Mars Curiosity rover team at NASA and Caltech’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. After the successful landing of the Curiosity rover in August 2012, President Barack Obama called to congratulate the team on their success, and singled out Ferdowsi for his unique haircut. Ferdowsi is an Iranian-American and science, technology, engineering and math professional who volunteers as a FIRST robotics mentor to get more boys and girls excited about STEM education.

 

    • Dr. Peter Hudson is the co-founder and CEO of iTriage. Using open government data, Dr. Hudson launched iTriage in 2009, a company focused on prompting citizens to actively engage in their own healthcare.

 

    • Abby Schanfield is a healthcare activist with TakeAction Minnesota’s healthcare team, a grassroots organization that advocates for progressive policies ranging from healthcare to economic reform. Schanfield was influenced by her experiences growing up with a chronic illness.

 

[Featured image from Twitter account of White House Office of Science and Technology Policy]