science

Selma DeBakey

Selma DeBakey is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Selma DeBakey rather than just read about it. In short: Selma DeBakey (3 December 1915 – 6 March 2013) was an American professor of scientific communication at Baylor College of Medicine who improved the field of medical writing and editing by designing and teaching courses to help doctors improve their academic writing and provide clear and concise medical information to patients. Selma worked closely with two of her siblings at Baylor College of Medicine, sister Lois D…

Key takeaways

Selma DeBakey belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Selma DeBakey to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Selma DeBakey from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Selma DeBakey (3 December 1915 – 6 March 2013) was an American professor of scientific communication at Baylor College of Medicine who improved the field of medical writing and editing by designing and teaching courses to help doctors improve their academic writing and provide clear and concise medical information to patients. Selma worked closely with two of her siblings at Baylor College of Medicine, sister Lois DeBakey, a professor of scientific communication, and brother Michael DeBakey, a cardiovascular surgeon.

Early life and education Raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana, by her parents Shaker and Raheeja DeBakey, DeBakey was one of five children with siblings Michael, Lois, Ernest, and Selena. The DeBakey children excelled educationally with both Michael and Ernest becoming surgeons and Selma and Lois earning advanced degrees and becoming college professors. DeBakey attended Tulane's Sophie Newcomb College where she earned her bachelor's degree in English with honors in languages and took postgraduate courses in languages and philosophy. While taking graduate courses Selma started helping her brother Michael edit his medical research papers as he prepared them for publication, a foreshadowing to her career in medical communication.

Career In 1941 DeBakey headed the editorial department at the Alton Ochsner Foundation and in 1944 she became director of the Department of Medical Communication at the Ochsner Clinic Foundation, a hospital system in Louisiana. DeBakey served as a medical writer and guest editor for numerous medical journals and became the founding editor of the Cardiovascular Center Bulletin. Along with her sister Lois, DeBakey created the first communication course approved for medical school curriculum in 1962. The DeBakey sisters were recruited in 1968 by Baylor College of Medicine and moved to Houston, Texas where they taught courses and symposiums on medical communication. The medical communication lectures focused on teaching doctors to avoid medical jargon and improve the quality of medical writing through things like avoiding passive voice. Baylor College of Medicine has a DeBakey Scholarship Fund in Medical Humanities created in honor of Selma, Lois, and Michael DeBakey.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Selma DeBakey

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Selma DeBakey claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Selma DeBakey before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Selma DeBakey ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Selma DeBakey

In research: Selma DeBakey appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Selma DeBakey in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Selma DeBakey is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1915 births, 2013 deaths, 20th-century American scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Selma DeBakey outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Selma DeBakey in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Selma DeBakey means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Selma DeBakey out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Selma DeBakey in simple terms?

Why does Selma DeBakey matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Selma DeBakey?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Selma DeBakey.