2nd year Medical Student
University of British Columbia, Canada
Seika Taniguchi (she/her) is a third-year medical student at The University of British Columbia in Canada. Her academic background is in Microbiology and Immunology, which she completed three years of in her undergraduate studies.
Where did the interest in spinal cords and cranial-based surgery come from? Her interest in neurosurgery is deeply seeded through her own experiences with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis. Having experienced the patient's perspective in navigating through the diagnosis and eventual fusion, she gained a great interest in how medicine should be geared towards optimizing patient quality of life throughout the entire treatment process driven by a foundation in a biopsychosocial framework. It all tied together during her first two years of medical school like neuronal synapses through her foundational neuroscience blocks and exposure to neurosurgery in her shadowing opportunities.
Her current research focus is on evaluating patient quality of life following surgery in cranial tumors and scoliosis fusion. She has recently published a review paper in February 2023 in The European Spine Journal analyzing the current literature to understand how "success" is defined in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) treatment: "Defining “successful” treatment outcomes in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis: a scoping review". She is currently conducting a quantitative research study on a patient's perspective of "success" in AIS treatment through one-to-one semi-structured interviews. The data has been collected with preliminary analysis completed. She will be presenting her results in the May 2023 Spine Week conference in Melbourne, Australia. Moreover, she continues to be engaged in cranial-based surgery research with a focus on patient quality of life following surgery or radiotherapy through the Vancouver Coastal Health neurosurgery division.