Brandon Dixon, left, and Shao-Yun Hsu are working to improve lymph node transplant surgery, a delicate procedure Hsu spent years training to perform as a microsurgeon in Taiwan. (Photo: Candler Hobbs)
Microsurgeon Shao-Yun Hsu takes treating her patients all the way to Georgia Tech, where she’s getting a Ph.D. and developing biomaterials to restore function — and quality of life — for people with lymphedema.
Shao-Yun Hsu kept seeing the same name on research study after research study: Brandon Dixon, an engineer at Georgia Tech.
Hsu, a microsurgeon in Taiwan, was trying to figure out how to help her patients with lymphedema — an uncomfortable and life-limiting swelling in limbs that results from lymph nodes failing to drain fluid from an arm or leg.
Hsu had what she thought was a basic question: exactly how much fluid each small lymphatic vessel could drain. And as she dug into the clinical research, she saw Dixon’s name over and over.
Spoiler alert: There’s no good answer to Hsu’s question. At least not yet. But the search has brought her to Atlanta to pursue a biomedical engineering Ph.D. in Dixon’s lab.
Together, they’re embarking on a new project with support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that could one day help Hsu’s patients by making a lymph node transplant a viable option for many more people who suffer from lymphedema.