Dear Dr.

Elyse Foster:

My name is Navya Krishna and I am a junior at River Hill High School in Howard
County, Maryland, where I am enrolled in the Gifted and Talented Independent Research
Program. My research topic for this academic school year is cardiac events during pregnancy.
Throughout this year, I hope to develop a more specific research question within this topic. I also
aim to educate myself further in this area. By the end of the academic school year, I hope to have
generated an annotated bibliography and research paper, and developed a product that will create
some new knowledge, solve a real problem, and be presented to an interested, authentic
audience. As part of the research of the process, I have examined a variety of scholarly articles to
find a research topic.
Due to my area of interest, a doctor recently recommended that I look at into the
Improving Health Care Response to Cardiovascular Disease in Pregnancy and Postpartum
Toolkit from the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative in 2017. After reading the first
part of the Toolkit, ​Cardiovascular Disease Assessment in Pregnant and Postpartum Women​, I
became interested in your work and its relevance to my area of interest. The real-world
application of this topic is very beneficial for my research, which will be metacritical. In the
article, you mention an X-ray and a drug screen as some of the tests that can be performed, but
are there limitations with those tests specifically, considering the health of the fetus? Also, I have
read that nearly 90% of pregnant women develop a heart murmur, which is listed as a Red Flag
in the article, so how critical is it? I would love to pick your brain, on the article and the Toolkit,
as well as on my research topic.
Because your work is so relevant to my research topic, I was wondering if you could
assist me on my research this year. I am currently looking for someone to guide me, and I could
use an expert like you. If you have the time and are interested, I would like to interview you and
would appreciate any resources you could refer me to. Any feedback you could give me to help
direct my research or improve any of my upcoming assignments, such as my paper, would be
very helpful. I have attached an overview of the course with information on its timeline. I am
available by email, phone, text, or whatever method of communication is most convenient for
you. If you prefer to contact my teacher, her email is ​msasser@hcpss.org​ .
Thank you for your consideration, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,

Navya Krishna