Latest Round of UREP Grants Support Biomedical and Social Projects

Now in its eighth funding cycle, UREP promotes a
deeper understanding of research methodology
among student participants who work under the
guidance of faculty mentors.

WCMC-Q researchers and students recently received grants for 12 projects through Qatar National Research Fund’s 8th Undergraduate Research Experience Program (UREP) fund cycle. A quarter of the studies focus on the development of diabetes at the molecular level while others range in subject from obesity among Qatari women, to ethics around cancer diagnosis and health factors influencing pregnancy.

Under the guidance of a faculty member, WCMC-Q students—35 in total—will work in labs, clinics and offices to gain valuable, hands-on research experience.

“At the pre-med level, many of the students don’t yet have the background to set up the investigation, but when they work with us and our ideas, they enter into a project that provides a great deal of research experience,” said Dr. Abdulbari Bener, WCMC-Q research professor of public health at Hamad Medical Center.

Dr. Bener oversees two teams of WCMC-Q students who are working in clinical, statistical and research lab settings to gather data that could potentially be published in journals. He has been overseeing teams of student researchers working with UREP grants for the past three years and says that most of them want to come back and work on another project.

With this round of grants, Dr. Bener’s student teams will focus on “Consanguinity, Short Inter-Pregnancy Interval and Risk of Low Birth Weight in the State of Qatar” and “Maternal Complications During Third Trimester of Pregnancy: Outcomes Among Arab Women in Qatar.”

“The UREP experience gives us the ability to think and work like a researcher,” said Bassel Saksouk, a second-year medical student at WCMC-Q. “To be able to formulate and test new hypotheses is a skill doctors need.”

The research experience boosts their resume as well, Dr. Bener said, and often helps improve the chances of them securing their residencies of choice due to the critical thinking skills they attain.

“In this program, they move from pre-med to clinical and have good experience in that they can tackle any problem and know how to handle it,” Dr. Bener said.

Report by Emly Alp