Student showcases healthful meals for children

Maranda Thompson, an MD-PhD scholar, is incredibly busy and eminently accomplished. She’s won a handful of awards and holds a host of offices, including:

• Student Impact Award for the College of Graduate Studies from the UNMC Student Senate;
• A year-long fellowship with the Yale Ciencia Academy;
• UNMC Graduate Studies Student of Distinction; and
• President of EMPOWER, a student-led, inter-professional initiative focused on awareness and education of domestic and sexual violence

But beyond the accolades, Thompson, a PhD candidate in the Medical Sciences Interdepartmental Area specializing in patient-oriented research, is using her MD-PhD training to make a difference in the real lives of real people.

Thompson, who works under the mentorship of Ann Anderson Berry, MD, PhD, professor of pediatrics and chief of the UNMC Division of Neonatology, studies how nutrition affects pregnancies and infant outcomes.

But she took that interest and adapted it to boots-on-the-ground outreach with the Women’s Center for Advancement, a local organization that serves as a designated direct service provider for victims of domestic violence and sexual assault in Douglas County.

Thompson has organized outings to grocery stores with dieticians.

And she’s launched a video series on quick, easy recipes, making nutritious meals with WIC (Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children)-eligible foods.

Black bean brownies with peanut butter

Breakfast burrito with WIC-approved ingredients

“They are meant to be quick and easy,” Thompson said. “Not having to read through a Pinterest blog . . . they are meant to be a minute to a minute-and-a-half long of just being able to watch it really quick, and then being able to do it.”

She is not the star of the videos. In fact, she doesn’t even appear beyond her hands. But, she is using another aspect of her training — science communication. Taking knowledge and giving it to the people. Ensuring that scientific information will help others.

“I ask, ‘What are the most important things people need to know?'” Thompson said. “And then I present that in an interesting way, and in a way that people will see it.”

“This project demonstrates her science communication skills, and how she has been able to seamlessly integrate her passion for community outreach with her doctoral research into maternal-infant nutrition and disparities,” said her MD-PhD scholar colleague Laura Flores.

Thompson is taking her research, and reaching real people, in a way that is “understandable, very short and sweet and to the point,” she said. That is the recipe for making a difference.