Research club raises the research bar for OU-COM students

by Brooke Bunch

Ekokobe Fonkem is leading the way to a new breed of D.O.s. Fonkem, a second-year student and native of Cameroon, a western African country, is recruiting students to join the Students of Osteopathic Research Association, a group of medical students devoted to encouraging research in the osteopathic profession.

According to Fonkem, SORA’s founder and president, many students in osteopathic medical schools are not research oriented.

“They want to go straight to clinical practice,” Fonkem says. That attitude, he believes, in the long run, is not healthy for the osteopathic profession.

“D.O.s are very good practitioners, but I think we can take a step further. I want D.O.s to be leaders in research, too, not followers.”

Fonkem added that a majority of American medical books and articles are written by M.D.s and most of them push their own philosophies.

“They’re not pushing osteopathic philosophies,” he says. “If the D.O. profession is going to continue to grow, we have to encourage research in the field and promote osteopathic principles. The era of evidence-based medicine is on the rise, making research a crucial task for D.O.s.”

Fonkem says the purpose of SORA is to encourage research within the osteopathic profession, leading the way to cutting-edge studies by D.O.s and osteopathic medical students. This, he says, is clearly in line with one of the aims of the American Osteopathic Association’s Council for Osteopathic Research.

He became interested in research while completing a summer fellowship at a laboratory as an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Fonkem’s father is a University of Wisconsin professor.

Fonkem, then a biochemistry major, says the principal investigator of his lab really supported his interest in research and made his fellowship that summer a unique and very rewarding experience.

SORA already exists at the College of Osteopathic Medicine at University of North Texas Health Science Center, Fonkem says, who added the two chapters will likely not have a formal affiliation, however the possibility of them working together exists in the future.

During its first year, SORA, advised by Janet Burns, D.O., assistant professor of family medicine, aims to recruit students who understand the importance of becoming research oriented — whether basic science or clinical — and what the club is trying to accomplish. They also hope to facilitate summer research projects for students.

“We’re hoping to start a series similar to the Policy Puzzle — called the Research Puzzle,” Fonkem says. “Through it we hope to bring in medical researchers — M.D.s, D.O.s and Ph.D.s — from the outside to speak to us about important research.”

“Students who attend the series, we’re hoping to reward with a certificate from Dean Brose.”

Fonkem, who was part of a team at Madison that researched potential cures for asthma, hopes to create an atmosphere conducive to research in which medical students can work together in making D.O.s leaders in medical examination.

“We want D.O.s to become a major force in research direction and policy in the whole medical profession,” Fonkem says. “As future D.O.s, we really have to push our profession into the forefront of research.”

For more information or to join SORA, contact Ekokobe Fonkem at (740) 707-2976 or e-mail at ef308003@ohio.edu.