学生抗癌领导bwin体育二人组项目帮助其他病人

College is about finding your passions, personal growth and preparation for the future.

For rising junior Taylor Webb, that all changed one spring semester at Centre College.

It was in her freshman year that Webb was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma. 而她坚持了几个月的治疗, courageously facing the physical challenges that accompanied treatment and side effects of the disease, she also encountered an entirely different battle she wasn’t necessarily expecting: the mental and social changes in her life.

Webb found the information medical professionals shared about her illness to be overwhelming. 转向互联网也好不到哪里去, as health-related sites invariably led to grim descriptions of the worst possible outcomes.

“If I can impact one other person’s life who went through what I went through and maybe not make it as hard, 那对我来说就值了,韦伯说. “我一想到它就很激动，它给了我一种使命感.”

在教师导师和姐妹会成员的帮助下, Webb is using her experience to make a difference in the lives of other young adults and those in rural communities by compiling resources from experts across the United States to provide cancer resources in an easy-to-digest compendium — heartened with humor and puns.

“翻阅一份癌症文件可不是厄运,心理学副教授德鲁·莫里斯说, the faculty member helping Webb and classmate Jane Daniel through the research project.

“It’s more than throwing facts and numbers at you — it reads differently than most resources that are out there, 专业、规范,他说. “I think that’s what makes people really excited — it’s not just another one-page pamphlet from a national cancer group.”

当韦伯被诊断出, she recalls being “bombarded with cancer pamphlets” that she said she never read “because it was so overwhelming.” She and Daniel are working to create a document that is more interactive and able to be processed in “bite-sized chunks.” Users can click to a specific portion of the guide, instead of reading the entire document.

韦伯说:“我们有很多东西要过滤。. “But I’ve used some of my own experience to hopefully help make this something people want to actually read.”

Morris originally worked with Webb on a course schedule as she navigated cancer treatment at Vanderbilt University in her hometown of Nashville, 田纳西州. A standout student, Webb was motivated to begin a research project early in her Centre career.

Webb realized that there’s so much more to cancer support than the physical side. 从媒体的描述到悲伤和抑郁, to relationships and self-image — Webb and Daniel distilled what Webb felt was lacking on mental healthcare and social well-being for adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancer patients.

“我真的没有准备好我的生活将会发生怎样的变化，”她说. “I started to think about what I could do to help others going through the same thing. That’s where this idea came from — writing a resource specifically for young adults, 因为经历生活中这么多的变化是很困难的. You’re trying to figure out who you are and what you want to do with your life when you have to deal with this ‘secondary’ issue.”

Both students worked in their hometowns — Webb in Nashville and Daniel in Atlanta — as well as on campus and across Kentucky. 他们的目标? 与该领域的专家交谈. 在总, 他们联系了350多名肿瘤学专家, 药剂师, 社会工作者, school interventionalists and more — to gather information for a comprehensive guide for young adults. 该小组还在bwin体育内部寻求专业知识, working with Assistant Professor of Biology Christina Garcia and her research student, 即将升入初中的莱恩·克莱门茨, 为了更好地了解癌症的生物学方面.

“我们把范围缩小到八个主题,丹尼尔说, 小组里的作家, carefully crafting the narrative and making the information digestible for readers.

Morris credited both students for their work, noting the experts’ excitement about the project.

“年轻的成年人, 农村社区的人们, 他们可能没有时间或资源深入研究癌症,他说. “当我们告诉人们这些学生在做什么, 我们得到了滚雪球效应——你告诉一位专家, 他们说, ’你也得和这个人谈谈.’ It has been exceptional, the amount of excitement and accessibility that has come from this.”

Both students said that it’s through this project that they’ve developed a better picture of postgraduate plans: Daniel said she’d love to work in pediatric cancer, 而韦伯说她想继续从事精神肿瘤学研究, 关于癌症经历后的心理反应.

The current draft is expected to be completed by the end of the fall semester — and both students are hopeful that it will be a living document that can be updated. Morris noted that he’s already shared the document with someone in his life who was diagnosed with cancer.

“它是可访问和可用的, 希望这是一种微调, refined and then maybe by this fall it's starting to get into the hands of people and health care professionals,莫里斯说.