Lab Results
By Bradley Beck and Tom Hanaway
Student Multimedia Reporters
Lab Detectives
Hailey Thimmig pulls on her bright purple hospital gloves and puts on her white lab coat. Cautiously, she picks up a test tube filled with a blood sample. She rotates the test tube a few times, punches some numbers into a computer and pops the test tube into the Culter Counter, a cell counting machine.
“We’re counting all kinds of aspects of blood - red and white blood cells, platelets, hemoglobin factors and a lot of other things,” Thimmig says, adding that med techs look for abnormalities in the blood that could eventually help doctors make diagnoses.
Hailey Thimmig (left) and Tyler Radke (center) learn about the Coulter Counter from John Strous, director of the medical technology program at UW Oshkosh. Photo by Tom Hanaway. |
Thimmig, a third-year student in the medical technology program at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, is learning the ins and outs of being a medical technologist, the professional who tests the fluids of a patient, read the results and interpret the information for doctors.
On this day in the Introduction to Hematology class, Thimmig practices using the cell counting instrument. She is one of the approximate 100 students majoring in medical technology, a program headed director John Strous since 1991.
The UW Oshkosh medical technology program began in 1956 in the
chemistry department with a handful of students. The program slowly evolved from its
birth in the chemistry department, and while the number of students has
waxed
and waned over the years, it has shown steady growth in recent years.
VIDEO
In the following video UW Oshkosh Medical Technology Director John Strous and student Michelle Cheslock share their thoughts about the growing field of medical technology. Video is shot and produced by student reporters Bradley Beck and Tom Hanaway and COLS Special Reports producer Grace Lim. Still photos by Shawn McAfee/UW Oshkosh Learning Technologies.