ANA FERNANDEZ

University of Arizona

Anafernandez@arizona.edu

Ana Fernandez is an upcoming junior at the University of Arizona, majoring in Medicine with a minor in Spanish. She was born in Tucson but grew up in Magdalena de Kino, Sonora, a small town about an hour away from the border. Her goal is to become a general surgeon and work for underserved areas, as she has experienced the lack of access to health services in her town.

Ana is also a peer leader educator for El Rio Reproductive Health Access Program (RHAP), which offers free reproductive services to young people. She is a voting member of the Youth Action Committee, providing strategies to prevent and end youth homelessness. Additionally, she serves as a consultant for the Youth Catalyst Team, a group of young leaders from across the country committed to using their knowledge, skills, insights, and lived experience to improve program practices and further mobilize the youth services field.

Through these programs, Ana has gained more interest in finding ways to support her community in fighting homelessness and other issues and the barriers that lead to it, while combining it with medicine and her skills in Spanish. She wants to continue advocating for young and underrepresented people to help reduce health disparities and make the system more accessible to everyone.

Aside from shadowing her internship mentor and a surgeon in Mexico, Ana volunteers at UAMobile Health Unit, Casa Alitas, and El Rio Food Distribution. In her free time, she enjoys going to Mexico, trying new food, and spending time with her family and friends. She is grateful for this incredible opportunity and thanks everyone involved for making it possible.

⊲ PROJECT

PRIMARY MUCINOUS ADENOCARCINOMA OF THE RENAL PELVIS: CASE REPORT AND REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

The research project conducted was a case report and literature review of a very rare type of cancer that a patient presented. The project focuses on a 68-year-old female who presented a rare malignancy, known as primary mucinous adenocarcinoma of the renal pelvis. Mucinous adenocarcinoma usually arises in the ovarian and colorectal regions. Primary renal adenocarcinoma of the pelvis is exceedingly rare, accounting for less than 1% of malignancies arising from the renal pelvis epithelium. The carcinogenesis behind primary renal adenocarcinoma is unknown. It carries a poor prognosis and there are no guidelines, recommendations, or evidence of active systemic cancer therapy effective for primary renal adenocarcinoma. By doing this research, newer cancer technologies could be utilized in order to best guide clinical recommendations and report them for future reference. Although, more studies on variant histology renal tumors are needed to provide more therapeutic insights into this rare disease.