Grade 4 Science & Physical Education
Sci4 has been participating in MissionX: Train Like an Astronaut program. This is a physical fitness and health curriculum developed by NASA. We are doing different physical exercises in phys ed classes that are similar to those the astronauts do. We have also been looking at how our bodies are affected by exercise and how our bodies use nutrients in science class.
As part of this study, we had a Google Hangout with NASA Flight Surgeon Dr. Josef Schmid and NASA Nutrition Scientist Sara Zwart, PhD. We asked them all kinds of questions about their work and how our bodies work in Earth gravity and microgravity.
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| Sara Zwart |
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| Josef Schmid |
How many astronauts have you been Flight Surgeon for? Who?
Josef has been a flight surgeon for seven different astronauts. Most recently for Tracy Caldwell Dyson when she was on the International Space Station for Expedition 23-24.
Did any astronauts not listen to you as a Flight Surgeon? What did they do? Why did they not follow your directions?
Sometimes they don’t listen to food recommendations.
What happens if someone breaks a bone in space?
Bones lose calcium in space. To help reduce bone loss, the astronauts exercise and eat less sodium and iron.
How do you, or can you, monitor the exercise equipment in space? How you know how the astronauts are doing in their training?
The exercise equipment sends messages by satellites back to Earth. That way they know how the exercises are going. The astronauts record their exercise and diet and report back to Earth.
How do you do a medical examination while your patient is in space?
The astronauts do the exam themselves but while they’re on the telephone with Joe.
Are there special medical tools that you use in space?
There is a special bag to collect urine samples that are used to test nutrition intake. There is also a special blood tube to keep specimens from mixing in microG after they’ve been centrifuged to separate the plasma and red blood cells.
What’s it like to be a space doctor?
“It is the best job on Earth!” He really likes it because there are always new things to study and he gets to work with really healthy people that are trying to stay healthy. Sara likes to see how the body reacts to microG. It’s a way of learning faster how our bodies work because the changes happen faster in space.
How does being in space affect your heart rate?
The heart rate isn’t really affected by microG. At first it might be sped up because the astronauts are a little queasy and excited with all the newness. After they get used to being in space, they go back to their normal heart rates.
What would you do if your patient gets sick in space?
It doesn’t happen a lot because they make sure the astronauts are really healthy before they go up. They have medicine on the space station just in case and talk to their doctor. If it were a very bad illness, they might come back to Earth.
Do you tell astronauts in space to go on diets?
We don’t really give them diets because it’s hard to tell them what to eat. Eating the same thing all the time gets boring. Enjoying food is really important to keeping the astronauts moods up. The nutritionists and doctors do make recommendations and hope the astronauts follow them.
Have any of the astronauts you’ve worked with had injuries in space? What kind? How did you treat?
Only minor things. The astronauts get sore fingers a lot of times after space walks. Sadly, Joe lost one of his patients when the space shuttle Columbia was lost in re-entry.
What are the most common illnesses in space?
Common colds are the most common thing.
Is it hard to treat patients in space?
It’s hard because you can’t see them or touch them directly. You have to rely on the patient making the observations and giving them to you.
How is working with astronauts in space different than working with patients on Earth?
You can see your patient on Earth. In space, you can only hear from them how they are doing.
How do you do surgery in space if you need to?
They’ve never had to do it. There are only tools for minor things on the Space Station. But for deep space, longer missions, they think they will need a medical doctor as part of the crew. They might also use telerobotic surgery that Joe is experimenting with.
What is the difference in medical school to be a space doctor?
Sometimes there are different classes that focus on how the body works in microG.
What kinds of things change about your body in space?
Your vision can be impaired. This is something they are trying to figure out why it happens and how to prevent it from happening. Your balance is affected, but the body adapts pretty quickly to it. Bone and muscle loss are the most common. Diet and exercise are used to prevent this. Your spine stretches out in space 3-6 cm. It goes back to your normal length when you come back to Earth.
How does being in space affect how you go to the bathroom? Does it affect the size of your bladder?
At first your body is trying to get rid of fluid it doesn’t need so your kidneys and bladder are working more. That slows down after a few days and goes back to normal. Your intestines take time to get used to microG and you sometimes become constipated. Going to the bathroom is hard because you have to go into a tube, kind of like a vacuum cleaner hose.
