The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Avon’s Ptacek jump starts path to career
Eagles grad founded school’s Future Scholars of Medicine, interned at Cleveland Clinic
Avon Eagles grad Marissa Ptacek founded school’s Future Scholars of Medicine, interned at Cleveland Clinic.
At the Avon softball team’s senior night May 31, head coach Ken Matuszak handed out bracelets to each of his eight seniors. The bracelets featured a word that Matuszak and his staff felt best embodied each player.
Marissa Ptacek’s word was helpful.
As a four-year letter winner for the Eagles, and the founder of Avon High School’s Future Scholars of Medicine club, helpful is a word that describes Ptacek on and off the field.
The club, which was set up by Ptacek after attending a camp at Northwestern University, is designed to help students get hands-on experiences in the medical field while also providing insight on whether or not medicine is something they want to pursue after high school.
“Throughout the year we probably had around 100 different kids show up. We had a lot of interest and did a lot of cool things,” Ptacek said. “We partnered with the Cleveland Clinic and got to do some volunteer work with them and they helped us set up meetings.
“One of the meetings was at the Cleveland Clinic in Avon, where we got to do all of this interesting hands-on stuff. We got to place IVs in a fake arm and do IO insertion which is putting a needle straight into bone so the patient gets medicine faster.”
Ptacek parlayed her time as the leader of the club into an internship at the Avon Pointe Cleveland Clinic, where she shadowed nurses and doctors.
She eventually, with the help of her internship group’s mentor, landed at Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, where she was part of a group aiding in a research project aimed at preventing nerve damage for patients under anesthesia during multihour surgeries.
“(The research group) created this pressure pad to map where the pressure was highest, and they made these mattress type things that angled so you could move the patient and shift their body position. So basically (my group) got on a computer to control the pressure mapping system,” she said.
During her down time at the Clinic, Ptacek was able to watch many of the various surgeries going on at the hospital. It was during that down time that she made up her mind that this was something she wanted to pursue as a career.
“For the rest of the time we could watch whatever surgeries we wanted, which was really cool because there was stuff like heart transplants and pulmonary embolectomy (removal of blockage from an artery in the lung) and cabbage surgeries,” she said. “We got to see all of these cool open heart surgeries.
And that’s where it really solidified my interest, I really like the heart and this is probably what I want to do for the rest of my life.”
On the field, Ptacek was the Eagles’ center fielder, making the switch from the infield after playing there for her entire pre-high school career.
Ptacek didn’t make the Avon varsity team out of tryouts her freshman year, after battling strep throat.
But after a varsity scrimmage where she was called upon, with the Eagles’ senior on a field trip to Washington, ended with her hitting two home runs, she was a staple on the Eagles’ varsity roster for the next three years.
In the fall, Ptacek will move on to her next chapter in life at Ohio State University, where she’ll study biochemistry.
After graduating, she plans to attend medical school before eventually accomplishing her dream of becoming a surgeon, and once again proving Matuszak and his staff correct as a very helpful person.