Matthew Schmidt Email Address

Clinical Pharmacist Specialist Pediatric Emergency Medicine

Founded in 1911 as one of three state normal schools for teacher training, Middle Tennessee State University is one of the oldest and largest undergraduate universities in the state of Tennessee. With a fall enrollment averaging more than 22,000 students for the past five years, MTSU remains committed to providing individualized service in an exciting and nurturing atmosphere where student success is the top priority. MTSU features eight undergraduate colleges and the College of Graduate Studies, and more than 150 programs and departments, including the internationally recognized Department of Recording Industry in the College of Media and Entertainment. Recording industry undergrad majors can focus on audio production, commercial songwriting or music business. A Master of Fine Arts degree in recording arts and technologies prepares MTSU graduate students for advanced work in audio production, recording and integrated electronic media.

While at MTSU, I was assigned as a assistant to a pair of biology professors as part of the work requirement of my university scholarship. That assignment changed many things about the direction I was about to take. While I did some of the usual grading papers and cleaning the lab, I also began to assist with the experiments being run in that genetics lab. Eventually I was mostly prepping media, running PCR's, and working with the spectrofluorometer. I loved the physical work of lab research, but more than that I loved the search for knowledge. This eventually led me to complete my University Honors thesis in that same lab on cyclo-oxygenase kinetics. At the University of Tennessee I never lost that passion for new knowledge even though I was focused on my pharmacy coursework. While at UTHSC, I learned of my passion for pediatric pharmacy and neuroscience. After a year of community pharmacy, I returned to residency at Le Bonheur Children's Hospital to pursue that passion. I am now completing a second year residency at Le Bonheur focused in pediatric critical care. I have also continued to focus my research interests in neurology and neurocritical care.