Ameer Abutaleb
Ameer graduated from the University of Maryland College Park with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering. While pursuing his undergraduate degree, Ameer gained research experience as a student researcher in the Microsystems Laboratory in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at College Park. After earning his degree, Ameer continued onto medical school and financed his medical education with a combination of the University of Maryland Diversity Scholarship and his part-time position at a local satellite company in Gaithersburg, Maryland, where he has worked for the past four years. He currently is an engineer in the Department of Operations where he works with others in managing a global satellite network for the United Nations CTBT (Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty).
Upon matriculation to the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM), Ameer’s commitment to academics is evidenced by his continuous pursuit of research opportunities highlighted by his work with the Department of Pathology and Division of Cardiology at the UMSOM and in the Department of Neurology/Neurosurgery at John Hopkins Medical Institutions. Notably, Ameer was awarded a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Research Fellowship and spent a year, between his pre-clinical and clinical years, investigating Slit-Robo ligand-receptor pair in the context of fetal development and glioblastoma. Ameer has also provided service to his local community, including teaching at the local juvenile detention center about sexually transmitted infections, contraception, and alcoholism, as well as teaching middle school students about human anatomy. He has held a number of leadership positions including President of the Muslim Student Association and received the President’s Student Leadership Institute Outstanding Leader award in 2012. In his free time, Ameer enjoys playing basketball and soccer and teaching Arabic.
Project: "Clinical Experience in Tropical Infectious Diseases Affecting Egyptian Adults and Children"
March 31, 2014 - May 9, 2014
Cairo, Egypt
What does the Kean Fellowship mean to you?
I am honored and humbled to be a recipient of the Kean fellowship and am very excited about the prospect of spending several weeks in Cairo to study viral hepatitis and schistosomiasis. I view this as a unique experience and a wonderful start to an academic career in internal medicine.
What do you anticipate learning?
I anticipate learning much more about diagnosis and management of soil transmitted helminths, as well as viral hepatitis, specifically hepatitis C virus. I will be exposed to a patient population that speaks an entirely different language than English, as well as a medical system which runs on the Arabic language. I will certainly learn much more about how medicine is practiced in a developing country with limited resources and very little budgeting if any for research and translation.
What interests you about tropical medicine and what problems are you interested in solving?
I am interested in developing effective methods and solutions for the prevention and reduction in mortality from hepatitis C virus. I am also interested in improving the long-term course of chronically infected individuals with HCV and reducing their morbidity.