Yay Utah!

Wow! Yes I have a new entry! It’s been TOO long. LOTS of stories to tell; however, for now I’ll just talk about my 3-day trip to good old Snowbird, Utah. I went with my supervisor, another prof from U of A and his research assistant. We were going for a conference on MUNE and QEMG. These acronymns stand for Motor Unit Number Estimation and Quantitative Electromyography. MUNE is a technique I am using in my lab on patients. Briefly, only about 50 people in the world use MUNE even though it started 30 years ago. MUNE is a method of quantifying the number of motor units in a specified muscle. A motor unit is the most fundamental component of the motor system-enabling one to contract their muscle. A motor unit, by definition, constitutes an anterior horn cell (cell located in the spinal cord), its axon (a part of the nerve that sends signals down from the spinal cord to the muscle), the nerve terminal (where the signal is sent) and the muscle fibers it innervates (comes in contact with). It is a very important technique because anatomically we cannot count how many motor units are in a human muscle, instead with this procedure we can estimate the number of motor units. The clinical significance is extraordinary! In patients with ALS (also known as Lou Gerhig’s disease or Motor Neuron disease) as the disease progresses there is a drop in the number of motor units. MUNE allows us to follow the progression of the disease, can hopefully allow us to understand the underlying mechanisms, and can be used for diagnostic purposes, and more recently allow us to determine if a drug is working or not in slowing the disease. Currently there is no cure for ALS. The patients often die within 3 years. The problem with MUNE is there are so many different MUNE techniques (5 major ones) and no one can come to a consensus on which one is the best. I use two. One is called Multiple Point Stimulation (MPS) and the other Statistical MUNE (based on the assumptions of the Poisson distribution). In a future blog maybe I’ll explain the procedure.
Anyway, the conference was exhausting! It was my first conference. From what I heard it was a very unique one because it was a focused group (about 45 people) and only the second symposium on this topic. Most of the participants were clinical electromyographers. I’m not, but hanging around my supervisor and his colleagues I have picked up on much of the medical jargon and was able to hold my own in the discussions. My supervisor presented one of my Master’s projects. We will be writing an article to be placed in a supplement of the Journal of Clinical Neurophysiology. The supplement will encompass all of the presentations and will result as a book. =) I’m still waiting on another paper that was resubmitted to the Journal of Physiology. Master’s has been crazy, but there has been some pay off.
One night at the conference, my friend from U of A and I decided to go have a drink with some of the participants. I learned so much from the experts. My supervisor went to bed instead. He doesn’t drink. I think that was my favorite part of the trip. I got to know people for who they were and learn a lot from their stories. I was pleasantly surprised to find a beer called “Polygamy Porter” lol =) The beer was disgusting; I had my friend finish it off. The logo was hilarious: “Can’t just have one. Take it home to your WIVES!” lol Good old Utaaaaah. Hahahah
I found out that people from Utah are called Utans (sounds like “croutons”). I was disappointed the Utans didn’t have a distinct accent. Oh well…
The trip was quick, but enjoyable. It was nice to get away and meet the amazing experts. I don’t know if I would visit Utah again. It was nice, but Salt Lake City appeared very small.