Laura Jones

BSc in Health Sciences

An aspiring physician, Laura found new perspectives on health in her undergraduate program.

It all started with a pure science background. Organic chemistry. Molecular biology. Labs. Then, Laura says, it became something more: a holistic approach to health, grounded in traditional science, yet capturing the human element of a social sciences degree. “I went from looking at cells to looking at disease distributions in populations. It’s been really refreshing.”

The interdisciplinary approach has opened her eyes to new perspectives in health, while complementing her pure science skills. She gained valuable research experience, participating twice in research with faculty members, as part of the Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA) program.

The experience has been diverse: her first project focused on  establishing mental illness burden estimates for countries in the Americas. In her second project, she explains, “we used electrophysiology to elucidate molecular variations in Dravet syndrome, which is a form of temperature-dependent epilepsy. So the projects were very different.”  

The diversity available has given her a greater understanding of what goes in to our understanding of human health—and where she could take her degree. “The fact that we're able to explore so many different areas of health has inspired me, and made me consider possibly combining different areas in my future career aspirations. I still want to be a physician, but I've also considered adding clinical research to that, or maybe a career in public health.”