April 15, 2016
UNC medical student Mary Shen recently won the UNC General Alumni Association’s University Award for the Advancement of Women. She is president of the UNC student chapter of the Association of Women Surgeons and has expanded mentorship opportunities for other medical students, prospective students, and residents.
Shen says she has benefited from being mentored by Jennifer Nelson, M.D., a pediatric cardiac surgeon who is assistant professor of surgery in the UNC Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, and Michelle Brownstein, M.D., of the UNC Division of General and Acute Care Surgery. She has done research with Nelson, using the Society of Thoracic Surgeons’ congenital cardiac surgery database to describe practice patterns in the United States related to valve choice in pediatric aortic valve replacement.
Shen, who is interested in surgery, particularly cardiothoracic surgery, as a career, received a 2016 Society of Thoracic Surgeons Looking to the Future Scholarship. She received a B.S. in nutrition from UNC and a master’s degree in nutrition from Columbia University.