Shooting Star: Medical Student to Launch Career in Aerospace Medicine
Now in her final year in medical school, Sabrina Ginsburg’s future is the final frontier.
As a little girl, Sabrina Ginsburg counted the months until summer, when her family left their South Florida home for Wisconsin and late nights staring at the stars. As she got older, she’d take friends along and teach them what they were seeing.
“It really secured my future career passion,” Ginsburg, a fourth-year University of Miami Miller School of Medicine student, said. “As silly as it is, I have an app on my phone and can tell you all the constellations and where the planets are. I love that stuff!”
When it came time to apply to college, Ginsburg told her high school guidance counselor that she felt conflicted between a career in space or medicine.
“I didn’t want to give up my dream of becoming an astronaut. Every kid has that dream, but I couldn’t shake it,” she said. “The counselor suggested I find a way to combine them and, sure enough, I went home and looked, and it existed!”
Medicine in Space
The confirmation launched Ginsburg down a path toward becoming an aerospace doctor, an astronaut who specializes in taking care of the crew on missions.
“Every time they send a crew up, they have a doctor who takes care of everyone on board and makes sure their physical and mental fitness is in tip-top shape,” said Ginsburg.
The future for the specialty is particularly bright. Demand for aerospace doctors is likely to skyrocket thanks to the rise of private space agencies and space tourism.
“We are used to astronauts being the most elite and healthiest humans that exist,” Ginsburg said. “With the advent of space tourism, that is not going to be the case. Astronauts can come in any shape or size, and we will need more physicians to do the pre-flight screenings and physicals and then go on board with the tourists.”
Aerospace medicine doctors confront a host of otherworldly situations. They must account for the effects of microgravity on oxygen levels and spatial disorientation. They also consider factors like radiation, vibration and isolation.
“Obviously it’s a developing field because we only know so much,” Ginsburg said. “The longest someone has been in space is a year, and if we are developing long-term space travel for years at a time, we need to find a way to mitigate the long-term changes of microgravity.”
Studying Bodily Fluids in Zero Gravity
Ginsburg joined a research team to investigate ways to manually drain lymphatic fluid in microgravity.
“We took 30 human subjects and put them into a head-down tilt position, an approved analog to microgravity that causes the fluid shifts you would see in space,” she said. “It’s not something a lot of people think about. But when you’re here on Earth, all of the lymphatic fluid drains to your feet because gravity pulls it down. When you’re in space with no gravity, all that fluid redistributes in your body equally so that fluid in your head compresses your optic nerve and causes eyesight problems.”
She presented their findings — manual lymphatic draining has potential as an effective countermeasure for fluid shifts toward the head in zero gravity — at a University of Miami conference and submitted a paper for publication.
Ginsburg’s unique path is one she has carefully charted since that fateful day in the guidance counselor’s office. She enrolled in pre-med classes at the University of Miami and became an active member of the astronomy club. During her senior year, she joined the U.S. Air Force and now serves as a second lieutenant in the Air Force Health Profession Scholarship Program.
“A high percentage of astronauts come from a military background and I wanted to make sure I’m the most suitable candidate to apply to be an astronaut myself,” she said.
In medical school, Ginsburg founded the Miller School’s first aviation and aerospace medicine interest group. As president, Ginsburg secured official recognition as an aerospace medicine student and resident organization chapter. The group now boasts close to 100 members. Its most popular event is a visit by the Trauma Hawk, a medical helicopter, and its aeromedical team. Members are treated to a tour of the equipment and a discussion on how medics de-escalate emergencies in flight.
Now in her fourth year at the Miller School, Ginsburg plans to pursue an emergency medicine residency followed by a space medicine fellowship.
“This will best equip me to handle any emergency in space,” she said.
She then will owe the Air Force four years of service, which she hopes to serve as an aerospace medicine doctor.
“That will be the perfect bridge to work with NASA or a private space agency,” she said. “I have a long journey ahead, and I know that. I take it one step at a time.”
For now, her dream might seem light-years away, but soon enough she’ll take a giant leap for medical student-kind.