I’m from Río Cuarto, ”says Dr. Martín Fernández Zapico, with A Cordoba tune He has not abandoned him, although twenty -five years ago he lives in Minnesota, United States. Then, with a pride smile, he points out a wall of his office and says: “That flag is that of the club that I am a fan, the Student Athletic Association (from Río Cuarto).”
Martín is married to a Cordoba pediatrician and has two small “minnesotanas” daughters and declares himself “very Argentine.”
But, in addition, he is a leading doctor and scientist who works with his team from the Mayo Clinic, one of the most prestigious medical institutions in the world, to find methods that allow “Customize” treatments to combat pancrea cancerS, a disease that in the near future could become one of the main causes of cancer death among the inhabitants of the central countries of the West.
His relationship with science goes far beyond his work in the laboratory because, as a teacher and mentor of other scientists, he is committed to make known that students’ access to science He exacerbates his creativity and ingenuity, both in the boys of primary and secondary school, and in university students, “beyond later they dedicate themselves, or not, to do academic science, I believe that science has the ability to create independent thinkers,” he explains.
During the talk with VivaFernández Zapico revealed that he chose to study medicine for the wrong reasons.
“I come from a family of a medium-low social stratum where, culturally, being a doctor or lawyer, can change your life. I went to medicine, but I never asked what it was like The doctor’s life. As I advanced I began to realize that it was not for me. I did it, honestly, for a cultural and little information. But I was lucky for three reasons: the first, because it allowed me to meet my first mentor; the second because I met my wife who is also a medical; And the third is that, due to an aberration of the US scientific system, an Argentine doctor has the same academic level as a doctorate. Favored me because it allowed me to do postdoctoral stays and apply to be a teacher. I can’t complain about medicine because it gave me things that are unpayable. “
-When did you realize that medicine was not for you?
-It was during the process of the care. I noticed the impact on me the suffering of the people. He did not have the ease of separating it, as other doctors do and suffered a lot. In addition, I liked science more and more because I had more freedoms and then caught his intellectual game. As I grew up, I began to find education very much, especially mentoring. Having students, having disciples, fills me a lot.
-Why did you choose to work with pancreas cancer?
-This field chose me. When I went to make the card for the Library of the National University of Córdoba, I saw that they asked for volunteer students to do cancer research work. There I met my first mentor, Dr. Mirta Valentich, who worked in pancreas cancer and was very excited about the problem.
-The statistics point out that, in the coming decades, this disease will become the second cause of cancer death in the United States. The projection is very shocking.
-The reason is that pancreas cancer almost does not respect ethnicity or social status, treat them all equally. Although on average all cancers have decreased mortality by 30 percent, pancreatic cancer continues to rise. And we have almost the same therapy, with some modifications since the last 15 years, a little for the nature of the disease and a little, at the time, due to the lack of critical mass of researchers. Regarding the nature of the disease, because it is detected late and when it is detected, although the tumor is small, it has great resistance to therapies.
-Why do you talk about lack of critical mass of researchers?
-The advances are given by the number of researchers and the resources that are invested in the disease. And this, in particular, has not had the same number of researchers who have other diseases. We have to train people and over the years I am giving a lot of importance to the education of young people in science.
-What are you working and your team today?
-Do you see the movie OpenR? Well, there, avatar is a reflection of a person; What we were missing in pancreatic cancer are these personalized avatars, which are called organoids. For example, the Avatar of the A tumor is different from the avatar of the B tumor. We had no models that would represent the disease in a personalized way, but now we are starting to have them. The idea is, thanks to these models and a change in the therapeutic strategy, try to enlarge the six -month window (N. of R.: Survival), to give chronicity to the disease. The problem we have, especially in pancreas cancer, is that we cannot look every day how the tumor is, because we cannot make a computed tomography daily. Therefore, we are working to have ways to make constant monitoring already distance from patients, with a small droplet of blood as is done with a glucometer, to detect how the disease is going to day, because, maybe we do not have to wait four weeks or four months to see the patient again and change the treatment. So, monitoring will allow us to handle the dose, which will be more effective. Adaptive treatments must be made, that is, adapt to the patient and the patient’s response.
-What stage is this work?
-This is a work of two laboratories of the Mayo Clinic and a laboratory from the University of Minnesota. The idea is to try to create a device that allows us to monitor distance. The device exists, it is feasible, but we have to make it small, the size of a glucometer. First, we will try it in isolated samples of the patients and then we will do the first test. I hope that we can start studying in patients next year. The other alternative is to incorporate a monitor into the port of the central road that patients have. There are already some companies that are working on that. The faster we have those monitoring, the faster we can change the way we treat patients.
-How did you arrive at Clínica Mayo?
-That little time I started working, my first mentor, told me “Che, Martín, look, there is a possibility of going three months to the United States to learn some techniques.” I was a second year student. Then, with a little silver from my family, a little that lent me, silver that they put from the clinic, I could come three months during my vacation. I did three stays, taking money from here, from there and trying to gather the coins to pay me the ticket. During the last stay, the laboratory director told me “Why don’t you come here to make a postdoctorate?” I returned to Argentina, we received with my wife and convinced her to come, so I am eternally grateful. I couldn’t have done everything I did if it weren’t for her. I owe the success, little or much, that I have. We arrived, and the five years of my postdoctoral one one day the head of the division told me, “Martin, would you be interested in staying here?”, And they hired me. I was very lucky and I also worked a lot. I adapted well to live in this duality of the immigrant who is neither here nor from there. You get used to, sometimes you have to live the bad of the two places and you have to live the good things of the two places. The language of the language is not the most complicated, the most complicated is the language of culture.
-Are you among the family’s plans to live again in Argentina?
-I don’t know, it’s going to be difficult, I would tell you how impossible, because having daughters here, pulls more. Before we have them, we always think we would return. But when the girls were born that changed, because life passes on the other hand.
-It clear that your work is passionate, but do you have other passions?
-I never was good for football, so I dedicated myself to other sports. When I was in Argentina I played Volley for a long time and, until recently, I did it here in a Rochester League. Also, with friends who do not live in the same city, we keep in touch and we have tried to adapt the sports we do at the age we are having. A few years ago a small group was created to which we call the Sensei Project. We started running a little, then we started swimming because it was easier and some began to make triathlons and to run marathons. Little by little we changed to join roasts to do a physical and recreational activity with the new family, the family we chose here.
– What project do you have for the future?
-In time I like philosophy more. I will not leave science, but I think that at some point I will dedicate much more time to this issue of education, philosophy in education and how to improve to create independent thinkers. It is too idealistic or, perhaps, too ambitious, but I think that the more independent thinkers we have, the better we are going to be because thought makes you more generous, it goes beyond any economic and social stratum.
-How would you specify your project on education and science?
– I think there are things that can be done at primary and secondary levels, such as using science and scientific method to provide tools to students. In addition, when the boys begin a career at the university, they should have mentors. I would love to follow a group of boys who pass through primary, high school and university over time, to see their progress. When you get involved and start teaching boys who are doing a doctorate, you can see the change, and, four or five years later, notice their maturity.
The workplace of scientist Fernández Zapico, in Rochester, United States. Photo: Gentileza Mayo Clinic.-What are strange from Argentina and your city?
-The people are strange, what you do with your people and what is happening to your people. Everything you long for is almost one hundred percent associated with those sensations.
-How would you want to be the future mediate of medicine and science?
-From the scientific perspective, I would very much like a way that what we learn in science, in laboratories, to medical practice will be expedited. That would be great. And second, within what medicine is per seI think you have to try to make it more efficient to make it cheaper, and I am talking to you from the perspective of the United States. In Argentina, where evidently the health system is different, it is something else.
