MetaCast

Hello,

everyone.

Welcome to MetaCast,

the podcast of the Meta-Analysis Academy.

My name is Randerson Cardoso,

and I have the honor here of sharing this podcast

with Isabela Marques,

Amanda Godoy,

and Gabriela Brandão.

I'm going to start by asking you to introduce

yourself.

Let's start with Gabriela.

Yeah,

sure.

So,

as Heather said,

my name is Gabriela.

I'm finishing a research fellowship here at the

Israel Deaconess Medical Center

in pancreatic surgery and about to start my

residency in general surgery at the same

institution.

And in the Meta-Analysis Academy,

I'm one of the mentors.

So,

I do mentoring one-on-one with the students about

meta-analysis,

of course.

It's a pleasure.

Thanks for joining,

Gabriela.

Amanda?

Hello,

everyone.

My name is Amanda.

I am from Brazil,

and I'm currently a fourth-year medical student in

the UK in Wales,

Cardiff University.

Hi,

everyone.

My name is Isabela Marques.

I am a physician,

graduated in Spain.

I am originally from Brazil,

but I've been a little bit everywhere,

Spain,

Germany,

and now here.

Now,

I am a postdoc research fellow at one of the

Harvard-affiliated hospitals,

even though the Meta-Analysis Academy has no

affiliation with any of the institutions that we

mentioned.

And I have just started eight months ago.

It's been eight months already that I'm here in

Boston working with research for a job,

for a living.

And my name is Anderson Cardoso.

As I said,

I'm a cardiologist.

I'm a cardiologist here in Boston in the United

States.

I currently work at Harvard Medical School.

As Isabela said,

this podcast,

the Meta-Analysis Academy,

is not affiliated with any of the institutions

where we work.

I want to start this podcast by explaining what is

the Meta-Analysis Academy.

We have a very high-level training program that

enables our students to do systematic reviews and

meta-analysis.

We teach the right methods,

the statistics,

the writing,

so that you're able to do systematic reviews and

meta-analysis with autonomy.

I want to make it very clear that we do not do

the publications for our students.

We do not guarantee publications.

You will hear all about the incredible work that

these doctors,

medical students have done in our program.

But it is their work.

It is the results of their hard work and their

dedication.

The Meta-Analysis Academy will give you the support

and the methods to get there.

And speaking of results,

let's start with that.

All of you have taken the Meta-Analysis Academy

within the last one to two years.

Can you tell me your results?

Let's start with Isabela,

queen of the Meta-Analysis Academy.

Chosen one.

I hold the title of the first student who

published a Meta-Analysis as first author in the

entire cohort of students.

That was two years ago or something like that.

Two years ago and 700 publications ago of our

students.

Go ahead.

That's a lot,

guys.

That's amazing.

Ever since.

So in this two years?

When I started,

I was a fifth year medical student in Spain,

didn't know anything about research.

And now,

two years later,

I have 11 Meta-Analysis published as full papers

published and indexed in PubMed and approximately

something like 40 abstracts presented in

international conferences.

Something like this.

Congratulations.

Who would have thought?

Amanda?

Well,

I think the issue that we were speaking about

before is that I should have counted before I came

here.

It's a common theme that you do lose count when

you start the Meta-Analysis Academy.

What I can say is that I have at least 10

publications published on PubMed.

And I also have at least 25 abstracts,

I would say,

with more than five oral presentations as well as

international conferences.

And I was just finishing my first year of medical

school when I started.

So it's been incredible.

Congratulations,

Amanda.

Thanks.

Thank you.

wouldn't say my number is true but with the caveat

that I started doing this 10 years ago

so I have 80 publications right now about 1,500 1

,700 citations more than 300 abstracts presented

in conferences but if you consider the number of

years that I've been doing this all of you have

done more than me in the years that you've been

doing this so Gabriela how about your results

yeah sure for me it was easy to take track

because I just applied for residency so in my

ERAS application I had 18 PubMed index publications

and seven of them were

meta-analysis so that's a very powerful tool for

engineering your CV so I and it resulted

on the successful application for residency and here

I am congratulations and we're gonna

we're gonna jump right into that because one of

the key messages that we share in the Meta

-Analysis

Academy is that it's not

just about publications it's about how it will

impact your career and I can think of no better

example than your amazing results so tell everyone

please about you know your spectacular match

not only a publication was not only useful as to

show how I can perform and make a project from

the scratch to the end to show how can I finish

a project but I also took that as

a very useful tool to make connections and I think

for residency application that's key like the

networking we do with that and and so a lot of

those publications especially meta-analysis I could

make the networking throughout the project so I

could ask for senior authors and they were in

different institutions at the time of the

application I could reach out to them I and ask

for help ask for some recommendations and that was

totally key.

for me so I think that speaks more even more

about the power of it so publications the

networking and

what's the result tell them about your match yeah

I so I was approved for a categorical general

surgery program at the Harvard institution so it's

a very it's mind-blowing yeah it's mind-blowing

it's the dream if there was anything that could

have been more perfect is that you know is that

kind of match yeah I mean many of you guys know

about the importance and the difficulty of getting

a general surgery categorical match let alone at

Harvard Medical School and Gabriela accomplished

all of that I'm under tell us about how Meta

analysis your publications that you mentioned

how they have helped your career still in medical

school I mean that's a loaded question I would say

because I don't remember the amount that before she

started the Meta knowledge Academy I've groomed

so much professionally in knowledge and in practice

I've grown so much professionally in knowledge and

in opportunities that have been provided to me I

remember that I've always been a very dedicated

student I was very hard working and I would ask

for opportunities but we were talking about this

earlier it's very easy to ask for opportunities is

very easy let's say to be hard working but people

don't care if you're hard working they don't really

care if you're just trying to get there or

even they ma what matters is the results there is

a saying that I really like that there's nothing

more useless than just a merely in well-informed

man and I think I really learned this when

publishing Meta analysis when I started getting my

publications my results that's when people

starting reaching out to me opportunities started

just appearing and doors started opening in my

career

so from just a medical student who would look for

opportunities try to publish try to get involved

in research now I present at international

conferences I have my name on PubMed I have

emails from journals inviting me to review their

paper and I participate in primary research a

really high impact primary research even though I

haven't even finished medical school and it's a

scary thought to think that next year I will

graduate and what is out there for me but I'm

I'm it makes me more confident that I've

built a track record with metanalysis that hopefully

will get me somewhere that is has

a high level of impact for my future career as

well well it's the hard work that pays off right

because the hard work of course is important but

it's it's it's important it's also critical to

have the results so we're going to talk more about

that about the differences of putting

in hard work and other types of research and Meta

analysis Isabella what kind of opportunities have

have you had through your publications in your

career well i'll start saying that it's funny how

stories repeat themselves all over so amanda studied

in wales in gales gales in portuguese

in wales and i was studying in spain guys and you

might think wow is this limited to my country like

why is it so hard doing research here it's so

funny how it seems to be like that everywhere

right because i also same as amanda said i don't

remember isabella before and i would try so hard

to get opportunities so hard it's not like i was

sitting and waiting for opportunities to come

i would really try and the amount of no's that i

got only lose to the amount of no responses that

and then after i published my first meta-analysis

after i finished the course

i started getting like same thing invitations from

the dean of my university from professors being

like wow isabella you're a student you have you

know how to make meta-analysis and i'm like yes i

know i was still i i'm the same that i was

six months ago but somehow now you notice me but

at the same time i have to admit i'm not the

same

because now i have something like to bring to the

table and that has really been kind of like

the mindset that allowed me to dream bigger and to

be here now as a postdoc research fellow

in boston who would have thought the same thing

it's pretty incredible um let me explain to you

guys briefly what a meta-analysis is many of you

may know but it's i think it's important to

highlight this a meta-analysis is the is putting

together statistically quantitatively the results

of studies that are similar to each other so if

you have a study that was done in spain in the

united kingdom in brazil in the united states if

you have these different studies and

they were similar to each other those authors

analyzed them independently of course and

published them but then as meta-analysis authors

what we do is we have the idea we do the right

methods for identifying those studies and then we

put them together statistically that's a

meta-analysis let's talk a little bit about the

advantages of this particular research method

and i'll start with this my favorite one is

autonomy it's just the fact that no matter

where you are you know um and in the world of

research you're not going to be able to

analyze the whole world the entire world we just

had a colleague here with us who is from a small

city very small city in the countryside of brazil

we have students from india from everywhere in the

world who don't otherwise have access to research

and the meta-analysis gives them autonomy amanda

can you tell like expand on that a little bit you

know how is it that people how is it that i'm

saying that people from anywhere in the world if

they understand the right method of course and

they have a computer and internet access they can

do a meta-analysis great around this and uh thank

you for that

that comment because autonomy many people confuse it

with just doing it by yourself true whereas

when we speak about autonomy in meta-analysis it's

not that you're just conducting a meta-analysis

alone actually joining a community of well-minded

like-minded individuals in the meta-analysis

academy for example that's what makes it powerful

that's where what takes you to the end but when

we say autonomy is that you know how to conduct

it every step of the way you probably if you have

any knowledge of research methods out there

listening to us you probably know that every

step of research should be checked by at least two

people so of course you're not going to be

conducting a meta-analysis by yourself but instead

of being that student that you're emailing people

asking for opportunities you know the method and

actually you can put together your research team

because you know how to conduct it and probably

the people that are

with you know the methods and actually you can put

together your research team because you know

you also do it creates autonomy in the sense that

you can you're able to take it to the end

you don't depend on well money that's a big one

you don't depend on an ethics committee to approve

your research which takes a lot a long time guys

if you if you don't know maybe primary research

research takes at least more than a year to

conduct to publish that's another another story

and meta-analysis can be done as quickly as would

say five weeks you know from having the idea to

publishing can be discussed yeah you you mentioned

a lot there and we talked about the autonomy just

how quick it is the fact that you don't depend on

an ethics committee and you mentioned about doing

it in a group and um i want to ask gabriella

this question because i know you have a spectacular

group with you know bruno

and patricia you know and so many other people you

know sergio and other other great minds from

the meta-analysis academy so tell us a little bit

about um if you knew all of them before if you

met

them in the meta-analysis academy what it's been

like to work in this research group how many

publications you guys have i see one every week

now tell us a little bit about that every month

i think there is a publication coming from that

group and i think that's so value like when you

have a very hard

working group

and everyone shares with different responsibilities

the work just flows

right so we can share uh different steps of the

the process together and have those results

i met some of them before and then i brought them

to the team because i knew how like hard

working they were and that it would like add to

the group but some of them i met on the way

because we find ourselves when we have this goal

right we are

looking for surgery we have the same path along

the way and we are all hard-working which is

and you're part of the meta-analysis academy yeah

so we find ourselves there with the same goal and

that's the best way to find your group like you're

going for the same way and we have so many

examples

of this in meta-analysis academy even isabella she

she when she started in the meta-analysis academy

she joined an incredible research group that up to

this day has incredible work together we like

i actually don't know how to explain it i don't

understand how to explain it but i think it's an

have i love to share this because i have all the

possibilities of groups that you can form to make

a meta-analysis i have worked with all of them

and they all gave incredible results i have worked

and

this is such a coincidence i have worked with

amanda before i've worked with gabby before

i have in complete different areas like with amanda

in endocrinology with gabby that's actually

funny because gabby was the one that solved the

problem with statistics so the thing is guys um

in the meta-analysis academy we learn how to make

every step of the way right so we learn how to

do

our own statistics and all that and we had a very

like hard to overcome obstacle in one of our ideas

and surprisingly gabby was the one one in the

group of the community that knew how to do that

and we were like hey hi gabby are you interested

in joining helping us and you know join the

publication she saved our lives and now it's

published

and it's already has like it already has like two

citations or something this paper that we have

together and with amanda the same we put together

i knew two people that had the same idea of

meta-analysis because that's also one thing that we

learn in the course like how to have your own

ideas right and it's funny because when we teach

the methods people start start getting the same

ideas because you know they're good ideas they are

viable let's talk about the ideas uh sorry

gabriella just a little second let's talk about

developing ideas

you've published in pediatrics and infectious disease

and cardiology and you're not a specialist

yet you've published anesthesiology one of those

published in endocrinology and surgery and others

not a not a specialist in those areas yet

gabriella published a ton in surgery will start

residency now tell us a little bit about how you

developed these ideas for your projects many of

which you were first authors in yeah i think for

me at least i i went uh after the topics i

liked and i think one really cool thing about meta

-analysis you can go for the latest of the uh

like new projects out there and put all the

together and create like a masterpiece so you can

uh publish a very late like trendy topic uh it's

still trending and that's that's cool so i went

after those uh topics but i know there's a lot of

other ways of course yeah we have a class one of

meta-analysis academy

that teaches this method that gabriella just

mentioned of looking at recent clinical trials

recent studies to develop your own ideas and how

about you amanda i really like the method as well

of the randomized trials i i get randomized trials

on my in my inbox on my email every day

every day with viable ideas and i think you become

so effective at looking at new ideas that you just

don't have the time to pursue it all so i do

have a lot of people that i help in

the academy in the community that i say like

listen i i found this viable idea i just do not

have the time because i have so many other meta

-analysis projects going on would you take it

forward and uh i've had two that have taken to

the end and had it published and i think that's

the good thing that we kind of touched upon the

community aspect of it when you if you already

know the word of academia it can be quite

competitive it can be quite frustrating at

times because the collaboration might not be exact

and it can be quite frustrating at times because

the

collaboration might not be exactly as you expected

and i think the difference in the

meta-analysis academy is that we end up helping

each other not only with the ideas but with the

process with the research and i think for me at

least that's the value of the collaboration

aspect we grow together not alone but coming back

to the ideas aspect of it besides randomized

trials when i started meta-analysis academy i was

very early on in my clinical years so

one topic that we that we always have is bedside

on the bedside looking at patients and i i thought

that this wasn't a viable way for me to get ideas

because i thought i have no clinical experience but

again when you know about how to conduct

meta-analysis when you when you know about the

process it only takes one moment it only takes

one conversation maybe when you're doing ward rounds

with a doctor to start an idea and that

was that was one of the ideas that i that i

started as well in surgery in fact

with a kidney transplantation that we we got an

idea on the bedside and i think it is a very

effective way as well because you're seeing it

right there and then the problem of the clinical

doubt should we should we use this method or

should it should we do a more conservative so

we was comparing more surgical managed conservative

management and i think it can be a really good

method as well so i like that one that's a good

one i've actually so i think i've used all of our

nine ten methods of getting ideas that she was

just referring to the meta-analysis academy nine

to ten methods exactly last one we have some

methods that are very straightforward to kind

of like switch the key in your brain to actively

look for ideas and that's so true what amanda

was commenting i feel like um we go year after

year in med school or medical training and in

the beginning one of the methods that i liked the

most was the go on the gas

website as well i love checking latest publications

at jama at um now jack imaging and all these to

look for for ideas like this super hot topics

there are latest published clinical trials and

all that that really like that one but i will

admit that one of my favorites is actually checking

guidelines so there's also this crazy crazy

brilliant idea that is looking for kind of

inconsistencies in guidelines from big societies and

they were

literally mentioned to your face like hey this is

something we don't really have clear

um we have this evidence but it's kind of lacking

one of my favorites you're giving away every time

works every time i'm not kidding well i mean she's

taught me about them but how to actually

perform and get these ideas i guess they can learn

it you can you can discover in the course so i

want to talk about a subject here on how meta

-analysis can be either a gateway for people

to start research or complementary in

in the research portfolio so for example in my own

career i was a first year resident at the

university of miami i needed to publish to get

into cardiology fellowship and i had zero experience

i

did not have any pubmed publications yet and i

learned how to do this and it took my career took

off you know in three years or four years of

residency because i was also chief i published

20 papers this really helped me to match into a

really competitive program at johns hopkins

and now i participate in clinical trials and i do

all these things but meta-analysis was the

first publication that's how i started i think for

isabella chu but gabriella you mentioned the 18

or 19 publications seven are meta-analysis so

clearly you've done a lot of other things that

are not meta-analysis you did a research fellow

here so tell us a little bit about how even

though

you you have research experience otherwise meta

-analysis contributed to your portfolio

and to your career sure and i think uh you can

have this as one of your tools for uh be a

better

researcher and for me it was interesting because i

had a lot of publications before like

considerably but not all of them or the least of

them were surgery focused or barely touched the

surgery topic and i was missing like a real like

clinical surgery patient uh research on my cv

like to show more interest that was not like that

i was into it into the surgical techniques

i was ready for it so that was the first um uh

appealing of the meta-analysis for me but later

uh even already having some meta-analysis published

i came for a research fellow and to do a primary

research it takes a long time and i had five

months to apply when i came so i thought i would

take my my box again and i will use the meta

-analysis tool and that's when i uh used my my

first publication

here and the research fellow was a systematic

review because that would be quick that would

be useful i could present a conference which i

would do the networking for residency so it was

very useful for me on that way and you can

impress your mentors right i'm sure people

were impressed about this three weeks yeah this new

research fellow who just joined you know she

doesn't even know where the bathroom is yet and

she's already published yeah she last in a month

yeah that's incredible congratulations and let's talk

more about time just about how long

it takes you know you said oh you can easily do

it in five months which is the time that you had

before your application uh she was able to do it

in five months and she's already published

your application uh isabella you are author of the

first publication of the meta-analysis

academy i remember that was almost two years ago

now you joined the course how long did it

take you to do that one and then others that

followed so that one doesn't count for time-wise

because i was still taking the course so i would

learn a new topic every week and i had to wait

until i would learn that

new topic to apply that in my idea um so that

one i think i had this idea around week four

of the course and by week 10 he was pretty much

ready for submission but that does count it's

super fast that's six weeks that's incredible

afterwards not kidding you guys i i think that

that summer break uh my friends and i so one of

i mentioned before how many groups i was able to

form inside the community one of the best ones i

keep in my heart i think all of them are the

best

ones i keep them all in my heart but the reason

why i joined the med academy that was one of my

best friends that insisted so much that i would

join her so we would do research together and i

was like okay bella her name is also so bella

like bella you won okay we're joining together

and then

that summer break we found one idea we checked it

was viable we're like we don't have anything to

do it's way too hot in barcelona i don't want to

go out i think we finished that analysis in like

two weeks that's amazing two weeks and we were

four in the group so it's not like we have you

know 20 people working it's four of us internet

connection and that was it a lot of hard work

you know the two weeks is is obviously very fast

but i would say that our students

generally complete a meta-analysis on average

probably around five weeks once you've learned

the method of course if if you're really good at

it and you have experience you could do it even

faster like isabella if it also depends on how

much time you have on your hand like if you're

on a summer break depends on the number of studies

so there are a lot of variables in the process

but

you can do it super fast amanda tell us a little

bit why it's so fast what uh how come a clinical

trial takes so much longer even a cohort study

takes so much longer and you're not able to do it

so much longer in a meta-analysis you can just do

it that fast definitely well what we're saying

here is definitely not taking the value of primary

research they are very important and we use them

in our meta-analysis of course but i think it's

getting the idea and getting it approved by an

ethics committee it takes a long time it might

take a few months in there for approval for

changes that you have to make in the protocol and

then actually starting the trial or the

observational study

and it can take a long time for recruitment for

analysis of data then gathering that data

collecting writing the manuscript so it can take a

couple years until you publish whereas

meta-analysis all the data is in there in the

literature you just need a good idea your computer

a good group right and that comes with the

autonomy and the community and there you go

you you just need to put it together you just

need to know an effective

method that we teach in the meta-analysis academy

so it's those two components is the fact that you

don't need to go to the ethics committee or build

a long protocol and then the data is already

already

available that's it you summarized it beautifully

yeah and then we can do it quickly exactly and i

think that that's what makes it so powerful because

you don't need especially when the

topic is very hot and there are some really new

trials like gabby said of oh you get uh the

notification of a new trial came out and then you

realize that you don't need to go to the ethics

in the introduction they say oh these trials have

also come out and they talk about conflicting

results that might be a good idea for the meta

-analysis and you just need to get started

a good example is one of our colleagues she is a

resident in endocrinology from brazil and she's

presenting now at one of the conferences that is

happening here in boston and she had a great idea

on a very hot topic and she just had just entered

the meta-analysis academy and ranerson who was

really good friends with her

said we're gonna help you don't worry don't you

worry so she helped her to get in touch with me

and other colleagues and in the group we really

really sped up the meta-analysis the data was

already there it was a hot topic so i think

that's the power of meta-analysis you can have a

good

impact in the literature summarizing data increasing

the power of those analysis we can

touch a little bit on power on another another

another time but i think that's the the beauty

of the method i think that

the sooner you do the more these ideas get

published the more the things get published

you end up sharing data in a certain way you know

so she could build their user experience

in a way or even不行 those techniques that they want

to see it become clever so

with someone else who's working for us who knew

just how to understand what they were feeling

what their goals were what their objectives were

and so we kind of super sparked that and let's

cuz

come on

okay

days.

It's a journey,

it's a journey,

and it's definitely worth the effort,

of course.

Guys,

let's talk about a contentious topic here,

which is the value of a research fellow in

residency United States application,

in application for residency in the United States.

Controversial.

Yeah,

controversial.

It depends on multiple factors,

but I know many of you are specialists in this

topic here.

Let's start with Gabriela.

Gabriela,

you did it both.

You did research fellowship,

you did a bunch of meta-analysis and publications.

You got a great match.

Tell us about doing a research fellow,

yes or no,

for the people who are listening and interested in

residency in the United States.

The answer depends.

There's no right or wrong answer,

of course.

But I would say,

I think the main factor is how competitive is the

residency you're looking for.

If it's a very competitive specialty,

as probably the surgical ones,

or if it's a very competitive specialty,

dermatology,

ophthalmology,

et cetera,

you're probably going to need it.

And it's not only for the publications.

It's more about the networking and the contacts you

made.

But during the year,

you have to show your capacity,

your hard work,

your results.

And with results,

we mean publications,

right?

So I think people that are going for a very

competitive specialty,

they're going to need it.

And if you're going to need it,

you're either institution or specialty might consider

a research fellow it's not mandatory of course but

that helps a lot with the networking 100% agree

Isabella a research fellow I also agree with

Gabby there's no there's no easy answer for that

there's no right or wrong I think depends on a

lot

also on how much you're genuinely interested in

research because sometimes and it's it's okay

not saying it's a bad thing it's okay if

publishing is just a means to get where you want

to get maybe you don't necessarily want a super

academic career and you just you know we often

share in the meta-analysis academy social media

this one chart that is like the average number

of publications reach

specialty for matching here in the united states

and you'll see like seven eight publications

time might be better spent if you just want to

reach that number to be considered for you know

one institution for a strong candidate you might as

well just sit at home for six months

work on six-month analysis and publish that that

will save you time money effort brain cells

many things so if research is just a means for

you to get for example a match that not

necessarily

super academic there's no need if you don't love

it don't like go spend time where you love

spoiler is that sometimes you get in love that's

not true yeah i think that's the point um my

family

even says amanda i used to say five six years ago

that you're never getting to research i never

thought i never thought

you

i think my take on it is then the meta-analysis

exactly exactly and now i want a clinical and

academic career so it's it it is a lot of

changing exactly it's a so then it comes if you

want if

that's what you want and you really are interested

in learning the method learning how research works

like in the background you know these slow slow

trials how that works everything that is involved

you learn a lot of course you learn a lot like i

learn things that i didn't like

like i didn't even didn't even know it existed

until two months ago and now it's my daily work

um but i i love it i love it i love it because

i love research but i think gabby said the key

aspects there are one networking if you want a

competitive specialty that really is game changing

the people you will meet the influential people you

meet you just might as well in one day be

sitting with a program director next to you and

you didn't even know um but again each case is a

case that's not mandatory and you might as well

publish if you're at home wherever you are in the

world it's fine it depends on the person and not

every research fellow is going to be the same

not every research fellow is going to make you

stand out so it really depends you know i

i i have of course i i haven't done a research

on myself yet but i have spoken

to a lot of people that have and i think my kind

of take up today it's it's that there's no point

in doing a research fellow if you just want

publications right you need to get something

more in that year and i know people who had no

publications and came to do a research fellow

here in the states and got disappointed because

they were expecting something that zero publications

i know that also got it to do a research fellow

how the reality of how things were got into the

meta-analysis academy and then started

publishing right so i think about if it's about

publications you know you might be best spending

your time in meta-analysis for example but if you

have the interest if you want to connect with

people i definitely think that it does have value

and if you mix both then yeah that's my toolbox

and

so let me give the one minute summary of this

which i fully agree with everything that you said

First of all,

if the specialty is super competitive,

you absolutely should consider doing it.

It's likely to be almost mandatory for some

specialties.

Number two,

if there's a genuine strong interest in learning

research,

you should also consider it.

Now,

number three,

it's not mandatory by any means.

And if you decide to do it,

first of all,

get publications before you apply.

You're going to become a stronger applicant.

Multiple of our students from the Meta-Analysis

Academy have used their publications,

should then apply to a strong research fellowship

like Isabella Marquez,

for example.

But if you decide to do it for the sake of

having publications for an application,

be conscious of two important points.

Number one,

by no means are publications and networking

guaranteed.

Don't put all your tokens,

all your hopes in the research.

Don't put all your hopes in the research fellowship

because a number of things could go wrong.

Obviously,

we hope that if everything works out,

but you can go to a place and your mentor moves.

Your mentor doesn't help you.

It's not supportive.

You know,

the institution is going through some problems.

So there's a number of reasons why it may not

work out.

And if the metric is publications that you're

looking for and it's an important metric,

join the Meta-Analysis Academy or,

you know,

figure it out independently.

Don't put all your hopes in that and then forget

to do everything else.

And then the number two.

The second point I want to highlight that people

often forget is the value of time.

You know,

when we're young and thinking about a career that's

going to last 40 years,

you know,

we don't generally think about the value of one or

two years to get us to the next step,

which is generally a competitive residency.

And that's fine.

But let me say that from a person who did nine

years of residency and fellowship in the United

States,

these years will add up.

Essentially,

if you're doing a research fellowship when you

don't have to or you don't have a strong interest.

You're doing it just for the sake of doing it,

you're paying a high price,

which is changing or trading one future year of

being an attendee,

of having an attending income salary for a research

fellow right now.

And that has financial implications.

It's going to extend the number of years in

training.

And it might not be an issue now,

but,

you know,

send me a message when you're seventh year into

residency and fellowship and,

you know,

you understand what I'm saying.

So balance these things.

And if you decide to do it,

do it complementary to the publications,

like the beautiful example here of Gabriela Brandom.

But I will actually take a chance to comment that

I think doing meta-analysis before applying for the

postdoc were essential for my application,

because also,

like,

it's a postdoctoral position.

They kind of expect you to already know more or

less what you're doing.

Of course,

they're hiring you to do research.

They're hiring you to do research.

Yeah,

you're not there to learn.

They don't have the basics of research,

they don't have the time to do that.

They don't expect that from you and they will not

pay you to do that.

So I think I when I applied,

when I got the guts to apply,

actually,

I already had like seven,

eight publications.

That's when I felt like,

oh,

my God,

OK,

someone might actually pay me some attention.

And it was actually great because they did.

My my current boss,

principal investigator,

he did comment on that.

He did say,

wow,

you.

You actually have a lot of publications like it's

a lot more than the average person in your level

of,

you know,

about training and as a last year medical student.

So that was actually the main reason why he

trusted me enough to hire me to do research full

time.

So without that,

I don't like I don't really think there was any

other reason that he would trust me enough with

that.

So even if you want to do a postdoc,

if you want to apply,

maybe Gabby might experience like share her

experience on that.

But I think you also have to bring something to

the table.

So even if you want to apply,

you have to prepare for that and you have to have

publications to show before that.

Yeah,

I think one value of that is kind of when you

show that you are able and capable of going from

the start to the end with a project.

First,

you show how you manage your time,

how you manage your tasks,

but also like a manuscript writing a manuscript.

It doesn't matter much what kind of research and

when you can write it fast,

write it very objectively,

you already know half of the way.

So that applies for every research,

right?

It's the proven result.

You know,

it's not when you're especially if you're a first

author,

you know,

you show that on your CV,

it's done.

Like people know that you know how to do the

work,

that you get it done because lots of people know

about research,

but don't actually get things done.

And it's just.

It makes your application for a research fellowship,

for residency,

for whatever it is in your career.

It's just like totally different if you have

publications,

especially if they're high quality and if you're a

first author.

So we're in Boston right now and the weekend we're

recording this.

Well,

at the time we're recording this,

there's lots of events in the Meta-Analysis Academy

where students are participating.

So in Sao Paulo,

Brazil,

there's one of the largest,

one of the largest cardiology conferences.

We have multiple students presenting here in Boston.

We have endocrine.

In 2024,

you will know better than me,

Amanda,

but I'm sure there are at least 10,

if not 20 people presenting here.

We also have the American Society of Clinical

Oncology with more than 10 students presenting in

Chicago at this time.

And we have the American Transplant Congress in

Philadelphia with my friends there.

Yes.

Lots of friends,

Gabriela's friends presenting Meta-Analysis and

Surgery.

And actually just saw one of them posting it

today.

So let's talk a little bit about this experience

of going to conferences.

And like,

but especially going when you're presenting and

Amanda,

I'm going to ask you,

because you're a veteran at this,

two years in a row of oral presentations at

Endocrine Society,

what's it like,

you know,

to go to these conferences and just like be queen,

you know,

like presenting?

No,

no,

please stop.

But I do have to say that I haven't expected the

amounts of oral presentations that I've had.

I've had it in at least five conferences now.

And it does build,

grow some skin.

So for this one,

of course,

you can never get used to it,

but it does make you a lot more comfortable with

the aspect.

And right now I focus on not only just presenting

and getting it done with,

because I think that on my first presentation,

that's how it was.

I was so scared.

I just want to get it over with.

I'm so nervous.

Right now,

I'm focusing on how can I communicate my research

because oral presentations do bring visibility to

the topic that you're talking about,

to the research that you're presenting.

And also,

I think the most interesting thing is the comments

that you get after your presentation and the

invitations that you also get.

I know some people,

even after oral presentations,

got invitations from journals to high impact

journals like Lancet.

So with my experience with oral presentations,

of course,

manuscripts and getting publications on PubMed are

completely priority,

but conferences are great for networking.

And when you network.

I think that's when things really,

really trigger for the success in your career and

the progression,

because I think we really depend on connection with

other people.

You find new mentors,

you find new inspirations,

sources of inspiration.

And even in this conference just now,

so just yesterday,

we went to a talk,

me and Larissa,

who is the other second year medical student who

presented six,

six abstracts in this conference.

For the second time.

She was here last year as well,

as a first year medical student.

She is incredible.

She is incredible.

She is incredible.

We both went to this talk and we had,

we were listening to professionals that we had met

last year,

very high impact.

And we went to have a chat with them afterwards.

And one of them recognized my name from a paper

that I had published.

And they took a picture,

they tweeted about it.

They put the paper in there as well.

Loved reading your work.

And we got even more people commenting on it and

a track on.

We have a lot of people on med Twitter.

If you don't know about it,

please do get involved because it is powerful.

And I think that's the beauty of it.

Even Larissa,

as we were speaking,

people are just so shocked how she's a second year

medical student presenting at one of the largest

conferences in the world for endocrinology.

So I think that's the benefit of all presentations,

posters,

presentations and conferences.

And it is something that meta-analysis really,

really add.

I recently went even to.

One of the cities in the UK and imposter syndrome

is a thing for everyone,

everyone,

and I submitted this research that,

oh,

it had been on the process that we were

conducting,

it had been published and I was just so

disappointed by it and thankfully with the methods

that we learned in the meta-analysis academy,

I was able to change it a little bit and now we

submit it for publications with some changes,

but I submitted the abstract and it got a normal

presentation.

I got to the conference and I did not know that

I was in the session for the.

The five presentations that were for a prize.

Wow.

Um,

and I had some colleagues there that are doing

primary research with me and they said,

Amanda,

you are,

you know,

you're against X person who is a PhD,

who publishes so much on surgery.

And I'm like,

it's okay.

I'm here for the experience.

I went up there on the stage and,

um,

I was,

I wasn't nervous before because I wasn't expecting

much because for me,

it was a disappointment that my research had been

published.

Yeah.

I had to change it.

I went there,

got really nervous beforehand and presented.

And guess what?

The one,

one prize,

the most prestigious prize of the organization

that's given to one abstract in the whole

conference was awarded to our paper.

No way.

Yeah.

How are we only finding out about this?

She got used to it guys.

She doesn't leave it common anymore when she gets

a prize on meta-analysis.

No,

but I think that,

I think that's,

you know,

I just never thought that I could be in that

situation.

Wow.

So because of meta-analysis,

people,

it brings you visibility.

In a world so valued.

Yeah.

And I,

I even,

I got back to my seat after presenting thinking,

okay,

now it's gone.

I've presented among incredible people.

I'm going to go away now.

And as I was leaving through the door,

because I had to catch my train to go back to

the city that I'm from,

um,

I hear my name on the stage and I'm like,

I don't care if I missed the train right now,

I'm going to go get off.

Of course.

So,

oh my God.

Yeah.

I think it's,

it's incredible.

These conferences as well.

I think it's a great opportunity.

Again,

things that add to your CV,

stories that you can tell and people that you can

connect with.

I just want to add a quick story to this.

You mentioned when you were saying,

so the,

we had a similar situation in,

um,

Amsterdam,

Netherlands,

European society of cardiology,

2023 last year.

And one of our students,

uh,

Mariana presented an oral presentation as well.

And afterwards,

the associate editor of.

One of the Lancet journals,

uh,

e-clinical medicine,

this,

uh,

this associate editor was in the audience and spoke

with her later on after the presentation saying

that she enjoyed the talk and that she invited

Mariana to submit her paper to this journal.

And it's a high impact journal.

Forget the impact factor now,

but I think it's 14.

I could be mistaken.

Uh,

it's again,

it's one of the Lancet journals from the family

Lancet and Mariana did,

you know,

if not such high hopes,

but she submitted it,

they requested.

Revisions are,

and,

uh,

the paper was accepted,

you know,

it's a,

it's a great story.

And,

uh,

came from oral presentation as well.

Larissa,

who was just here,

you mentioned also,

she is a second year med student,

and she's in touch with the president of the

Brazilian society of endocrinology who knows her

from the conferences where she's presenting.

So,

you know,

a great stories I could,

I could go on and on,

but I want to ask Gabriela about her experience as

well,

because I've definitely seen you on the podium from

some,

uh,

conference.

I did,

uh,

two,

uh,

following years.

Yeah.

For the podium and the two of them were,

uh,

meta-analysis.

The last one was my application year and was

gorgeous to see.

Visibility.

Yeah.

It was a very,

uh,

big audience and it was a very,

like a controversial topic that I was closing,

uh,

like summarizing what we should do,

like drain or not drain.

Which conference was that?

Uh,

the American College of Surgeons.

So the biggest,

yeah.

Oral presentation.

Oral.

Yeah.

It was very,

uh,

so it was very like a controversial topic.

Everybody was excited.

And then just after the presentation,

like everybody came to ask more about it.

Like,

well,

how do you do or,

uh,

what are the conclusions?

Why are we going with that?

What do you agree or not?

So we became the reference.

Yeah.

We came,

we have such a good discussion.

And one of,

one of the discussion was with one,

uh,

associate program director,

which I was interviewed later.

So he was.

It was even more special.

It was awesome.

Yeah.

No,

that's fantastic.

And so to me,

I'll just add like is crazy,

Gabby saying how she really closed a gap in

literature.

And that is so like,

that is such an amazing aspect of meta analysis.

And just one of these days I was checking the

social media meta analysis Academy social media and

saw a Med student that was cited on an

international guideline for something.

And it's like,

God,

these people are getting cited by guideline.

Yeah.

solving the problems that are there,

like,

oh,

we're lacking this information,

like we don't know very well,

and one of our students are getting the answer.

The name of the legend is Matheus Gauza.

He's a six-year medical student.

He was cited with his group of co-authors in an

international guideline.

And not just him,

but multiple of our students,

you know,

you get papers like Gabriela's paper.

You know,

if you do a high-quality meta-analysis,

be ready.

It's going to be cited in international guidelines.

That's for sure.

Definitely,

and again,

another thing that brings you visibility and what

separates primary research from meta-analysis,

it's a common theme.

Primary research is very valuable,

but you see the guidelines citing the meta

-analysis.

And I'm sorry,

but if you can bring that into an interview,

your paper being cited by a guideline and you

solving a clinical issue,

I think that's a great conversation starter and a

great contributor

to convincing that person that,

yes,

you do have a problem.

You do have value because you speak a lot about

this,

about how mentorship works.

Many people are not bringing value to the table,

and I think that's what's missing,

and meta-analysis definitely do that.

Yeah,

it's one of the ways,

you know,

certainly whenever you are,

whether it's in a research fellowship or in any

other situation

where you're a mentee and you have a mentor,

you really need to show your value.

There's no doubt about that.

So we're coming to a wrap here.

I want to give you all,

the opportunity to do some final considerations,

and I'm going to start with Isabella.

No pressure.

Just my final consideration is,

wow,

it was a good talk.

Like,

so many things that I have to wrap up now,

but I think I'll just go to the most basic aspect

that we started this talk

saying how much we and Amanda,

we don't even remember the pre-meta-analysis

academy,

Isabella and Amanda,

and that's because so many things,

things changed and achievements that I would never

have expected,

doors that were open that I could never imagine.

And I think the value of getting into the

community

and learning how to do this yourself with autonomy,

with your power of controlling the time of that is

you're able

to dream so much bigger than you initially

expected.

And that's just it.

Sometimes we just get so focused,

focused in the,

like,

rushing process.

I'm doing it with everything,

just getting this one path that everyone tells you

just do this and it will work out.

Then you come a little bit out of the curve.

You learn something new and it opens a whole new

world.

And I think that's really what meta-analysis

changed in my life.

And yeah,

I just have to be grateful here,

meeting all these amazing people that I have been

working with together for like two years.

And it's a community everywhere.

It's amazing.

Yeah,

I love this community.

And it's a really hard thing to summarize.

all of our experiences all the amazing people that

we have met and all the the the network that we

have built over the years into just the summary so

i'm really glad that we're starting this this

new series of talks that we're going to be

discussing so much about meta-analysis but if i

can summarize in three things i get so many

questions about potential students that want

to enroll in meta-academy in meta-analysis academy

um is it a secret formula is it just a magic

recipe and definitely definitely it's very powerful

definitely feels magical but it's not

and i often bring three things to them first the

effective method and you're definitely going to

get that in the meta-analysis academy you're

definitely going to know to how to create autonomy

how to know every step of the way we'll guide you

with that you saw in bella's example how she was

able to take it after the course finished a week

after she submitted for publication so that's one

thing that i'm going to share with you today and

i'm going to share with you guys a little bit

a really powerful method that meta-analysis provide

as you have seen through today the second one is

the mindset we have been speaking here about hard

work dedication and that's definitely not different

with meta-analysis you're gonna have to put the

effort in but the difference is that the effort

that you're putting in definitely bears fruit it

definitely counts and you're gonna get a lot from

it and the third one which bella touched upon is

the community and we are all i believe so

happy to be part of it of the second family of

the second family of the second family of the

second

family that has a lot of collaboration and when

you connect with like-minded individuals that have

this growth mindset then you're sorted so if you

have any interest in those three things because

they have to be together by by the dream that

meta-academy provides because it's is a really

good one and you're gonna go very far so i think

that's my little bit of a summary i have to say

that the matter uh really opens the like open the

door for me to be a part of it and i think

that's

it's not like all of you know kind of all of

this like open doors but what really matters in

the

academy is definitely the people and in the people

for some reasons i think uh networking is one of

them you can networking among the other mentees and

the other students attendings even like we

have brilliant people in the community uh but also

like uh consonant analysis research is be is

becoming a more competitive like it's very we have

to publish fast the methods it came out on the

be complex and some topics and we have experts for

every single step of the way like yourself

no not like myself but there are some people that

are really in the statistics very complex

models and we have we have them all together uh

helping each other and i think that's priceless

really yeah no thank you so much and

congratulations to all of you i'm going to actually

take three

closing points here i'm gonna cheat and not just

just one number one is that i want to emphasize

just how grateful and thankful i am to all the

people who made the meta-analysis academy happen

you know amanda is our director of social media

isabella has been an ambassador has been a tutor

in the program gabriella is a mentor in the

program and so many people that i i wouldn't

have time to mention the great contributions the

support that our students have the community that

was mentioned multiple times it's all credit to the

great people who make it happen a number

Number two,

I want to emphasize the same point that I talked

about in the beginning.

All the results that you've heard from them,

but also from the hundreds of students that have

joined the Meta-Analysis Academy is really the

results of their hard work,

their dedication.

We provide the method.

We do not do publications.

Publications are not guaranteed.

It's up to you and our students to really take

the opportunities,

the method,

and really take that forward and bring it to

publication.

And my final message is for you to join the Meta

-Analysis Academy if you're not a part

yet of this team,

to learn how to conduct high-impact research with

autonomy to transform your career.

That's our mission,

and I hope you will join us.