T H E 2 S P I D E R M A N M E M E
Although both terms end with ‘professor’, a clinical professor and a scientific professor greatly differs from one another. As Hong Kong has only 2 medical schools (CUHK & HKU), the severity in lacking doctors is no surprise. Thus, 50% of a professor’s work involves being a usual doctor in the hospital, in which you will see patients, visit wards and go to clinics; the rest of the 50% is split into teaching and doing research.
But in a wider perspective, globally speaking, the proportion will lean more towards research and less clinical. “As clinical professors,” Philip voices, “We start off as doctors and physicians. Then, we will grow our interest in academics. But for us, the training and mentality will always revolve around patients.”
“There is a saying in clinical research,” As he continues, “‘From bench to bedside.’ We have to consider the applicability and relevance of our research questions to patients and make a difference in managing for their wellbeing.” For other streams in science or non clinical research however, their focused subjects tend to be more scientific and noble. “They will come up with things that are publishable but we will play the role as a translational researcher or facilitator.” Philip expresses, “We try to take the science and make it applicable or make a difference in the patients’ lives.”
M O R A L D I L E M M A
While discussing the broad area of medicine research, Philip provides us with a brief summary of what needs to be done when one undergoes investigation. Other than plainly fixating on textbook studying, experiments are highly encouraged as they are the perfect demonstration of the safety your logic holds.
With that being said, unethical results often appear when experiments are performed, and much like all of your other responsibilities, you can never be rid of them. Rather than running away from your problems, you should look for ways to tackle them. Similarly, during the first few rounds, experiments will be performed on extracted cells from dead animals, emphasis on the part dead as no animals are harmed during this phase. Once you have proven yourself worthy by ensuring that the results of your experiments are harmless to animals, you will apply the same method to small animals.
“It is quite unfortunate,” Philip admits, “But we tend to think that the smaller the animal, the safer the experiment would be.” After small animals experiments, you can move up to larger animals such as dogs or monkeys, and lastly, you will get a healthy human volunteer and a sickly patient to finalize your investigation.
“However, at every stage, you will need to pass a rationale.” Philip assures, “Out in the real word, you will seek an ethical board in which they will teach you the procedures and the criteria. This is the only way that everyone’s safety is ensured.”
G E T Y O U R M I N D G E A R S W O R K I N G
Research isn’t solely about methodology, the most useful skill in investigations is the ability in processing the accuracy and appropriateness of certain “facts” against the progression of time. “Growing up,” Philip recounts, “ I believed that my memorization skills are excellent. You could tell me to read a chapter, and I could memorize it out for you. But then I reached a stage in my career in which I realized that I can question the facts other people had written. In real life, when you see patients, you may find some contradictory things to your learning. And you need to begin asking why 200 years ago, would a certain doctor determine this as fact A or rule B. You need to know which facts are true and which are outdated.”
Philip strongly discourages blind belief in everything that is given to you, if that had happened to the entire world, medical progress would have been non-existent. To have a successful career path, he believes that one must (reasonably) challenge certain things and sort out information that has been long inapplicable and irrelevant to today’s society. “This is the most fulfilling thing for me in research,” Philip expresses, “To find out things that no one has ever identified before, or renew outmoded knowledge.”
As he suggests an example, Hong Kong’s medical industry, in a western doctor’s perspective, is limited and falling behind other countries. Many diseases are also often disregarded by just reading Western medicine books, but you have to understand that many Western diseases do not apply to Easterners or Asians. With cultural and physical differences, our treatments and utilization of medicine differ, so you cannot automatically assume or follow what the Western medicine books instruct upon. We must consider our own factors first and ask whether or not do we need to do some studies to prove that the methods in the books are correct, or perhaps we ourselves can find a better way to handle the disease.
