By Jasmine Reynoso—

Mrs. Cilento’s Health Occupations Class held a spelling bee on medical terminology in which the winner would be granted a new stethoscope. The two winners, one from each class section, were seniors, Robert Sanchez and Merixti Andujar.

The competition was fierce and it was clear that these students worked very hard to win this competition. Robert Sanchez said, “I self-tested an hour or two daily,” to prepare for the challenges by other really smart students in this class. The winning word was “ectogenesis,” which is just one of the hundreds of words that Sanchez learned for this competition. “It means to develop outside the body, by the way,” said Sanchez. He will use his new stethoscope to practice measuring blood pressure and beats per minute at Eastwick College.

Senior Vidhi Gandhi, was Sanchez’s chief competition. Even though she lost, Gandhi was glad to see Robert win. “He deserved it;” Gandhi said, “He is a hard worker.” Gandhi said that her anatomy class helped her greatly, to prepare for this competition. She also made flash cards and studied them for fifteen minutes a day. Gandhi has been gaining experience by taking an introduction to nursing program at William Paterson University, where she studied anatomy and physiology for three weeks.

Merixti Andujar won from the second section of Health Occupations. She was glad to be to the winner and acknowledged the tough competition from her classmates. She also thanked Mrs. Cilento for quizzing the class daily before the contest. “Everyone did a good job. We all should have gotten a prize for the hard work we put in,” said Andujar of her class. As for the stethoscope, she plans to show it off at home and test it on her cat. Andujar plans to go to PCCC to continue her medical education and then transfer to UMDNJ.

“Medical terminology is an important skill for all students who want to pursue a health career,” commented Mrs. Cilento about her inspiration for creating this contest, “but the skills that I observed in my two winners is their kindness and concern for others. Without these qualities they will not be a health professional that understands the needs of their patients.” These PHS students certainly will have a bright future in their chosen medical fields. They are off to a great start.