SHAKER HEIGHTS -- Students in University Schools Young Surgeons Club are getting the kind of experience some dont receive until medical school.

The Young Surgeons Club at University School Shaker Campus is an afterschool enrichment program started last year by middle school science teachers Dr. Roberta Brown and Kathy Osborne.

Osborne said when Brown came on board at University School, the teachers were required to find another dimension of teaching. While other teachers coached sports teams after school, Osborne and Brown honed in on a medicine course they could develop. Out of that idea came the Young Surgeons Club.

Club Activities

The club consists of 12 seventh and eighth grade boys who get to experience the ins and outs of the medical field. Recently, the group took a trip to MetroHealth and attended an emergency room simulation where they learned intubation and resuscitation.

The simulation lends them the opportunity to understand a more hands-on approach and what a medical staff needs in an emergency, Brown said. They can see a combination of how technology can be used in medical training. They can use their communication abilities so each person knows what his partner is doing together to help a patient.

Osborne said the group also got to conduct ultrasounds on each other, got to see the Metro Life Flight helicopter up close and met the medical crew and pilots during the visit.

They were trained how an intern or resident would be trained. They got to see the training dummy that breaths, has a pulse and bleeds. The doctors spent a lot of time with them, she said.

The group plans to take a trip to the Cleveland Clinic Beachwood Family and Health Center to take a tour of the surgical suite and learn how to scrub in for surgeries.

Brown said the students enthusiasm is infectious. Its very satisfying to see them get excited about learning about medicine, learning to use tools and dissections.

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Shaker Heights University School enrichment program assists young surgeons