QMedCONNECT: May 2011

QMedCONNECT Newsletter:Special Coverage Medicon- May 2011

Dear friends,

The month of May was special to QMed. It was the month where Undergraduate Medical Students had their Annual Conference - Medicon. One usually tends to associate UG students with "youth and fun". This event had its share of fun. But it is one where this group of future medicos gather to share and learn about their research projects. Most of them are projects done under the ICMR's STS scheme. This year the event was held in Grant Medical College, Mumbai. I was privileged to speak at two preconference workshops and to judge two poster sessions. But more importantly, Medicon 2011 (and previous Medicons) show how that there are students very keen on learning about research. There are some who would like to make a career in research; there are others who hope to always do some research as part of their practice. We hope that they find their calling. What is very special about this conference is that it is completely organized and coordinated by students. The organizing team every year gets a tremendous learning experience with all that they do to make the event a success.

There were several excellent plenary sessions at the event. The students are always grateful to these speakers and I would add that I was fortunate to hear them too. I would like to quote Dr Vinay Kumar (co author of Robbins Textbook of Pathology) who gave important messages like "When you do research, put societal benefit before self", and "Don't rush to be first, accuracy of your research is more important".

This month, I also had the opportunity to address faculty and students of the College of Nursing, Jaslok Hospital to tell them about literature searching. QMed would love to reach out to all allied health professionals, and such opportunities are a delight.

The talk at TMH, had doctors from Iraq, Africa and Malaysia asking if they could become Friends of QMed, and if I would visit their institutions! I am grateful to them for their feedback.

Vasumathi Sriganesh

Medicon 2011: May 11th - 14th 2011

Medicon is an annual international research conference for undergraduate medical students, organized in India. It presents a platform for young scientists and future doctors to meet, interact and present their research.

Vasumathi Sriganesh with Dr. Tambu David, jointly organised a EBM workshop

Talk on Literature Searching by Vasumathi Sriganesh

Participants of the Workshop

Abhimanyu Singh, Organising Secretary- handing over a bouquet to Vasumathi Sriganesh

Judging a Poster Session

Vasumathi Sriganesh with Organising Secretary, Abhimanyu Singh

Become a Friend of QMed
Whether you are a student, academician or practitioner or an Institution, you could become a Friend of QMed and support our activities. In return, we will share our expertise with you. Through this program we wish to make a difference to students in the healthcare sector, and have them emerge as health professionals of tomorrow, who will incorporate Evidence based practice. Program details (Check out the Hotlinks at the end of the page). And - if you believe in our cause, we invite you to "Become a friend" now!

Do You Know?

Check out if your article is cited - through Google Scholar and PubMed

Have you written an article and wondered who else has cited it? There are two resources through which you can check.

Google Scholar. Type in your name and for any article you have published (and is available somewhere on the net), just below the reference details, you will get a link - "Cited by 4" (the number will be actual number of citations). Click the link and you will see the references of the articles that have cited yours. A note of caution - you will find duplicates for various reasons, so you will have to manually remove those

PubMed. In PubMed, you will know how many "PubMed Central" references have cited your article. Go to PubMed and first login to "MyNCBI" (Create an account for yourself if you have not done so earlier).
Run your search with your name, as follows: "Deshpande A"[au]. In the result page, on the right side, click the link "Manage Filters". In the next page, on the right side, under "Select Category", choose "Links". In the search box, type "Links to PMC" and click Search. In the next page, you will get two options; choose "Links to PMC references". Tick the box under "Active". Now in your PubMed result page, you will get a link on the right side under "Filter your results", which says "Links to PMC references" and that will give you a list of PubMed Central references that cite your article.

Forthcoming Training Programs/Lectures:

June 16, 2011. Lecture on literature searching for FAIMER Fellows, at KEM Hospital, Mumbai

Other Events of Interest

South Asian Cochrane Network & Centre - Workshops on Systematic Reviews - More details

Clinical Research Workshop Series. Conducted by the Public Health Foundation of India. More details

If you are organizing or know about other conferences, pre-conference workshops or training programs related to medical research, do let us know; we would like to include these in our website and newsletter.

Resources for You:

Supercourse Lectures. Supercourse is a repository of lectures on Global Health and Prevention. if you wish to receive a copy, do write to us at info@qmedkf.org.in

UpToDate. We, as trainers of UpToDate - [www.uptodate.com], can give one month complimentary trial passwords. Do write to us at info@qmedkf.org.in if you would like to have one.

Article of the Month

Patwardhan B.

Ayurveda, evidence-base and scientific rigor.

J Ayurveda Integr Med 2010;1:169-70

A very interesting and thought provoking article on the importance of Ayurvedic research, with a focus on the need to adopt intercultural standards for research, for the appropriate methodology and protocols. The author stresses that doing research based completely on methods in modern science will not work; Ayurveda does need certain adaptations, based on the very nature of its traditional bases. As Editor in Chief of the Journal, he stresses that every effort will be made, to guide authors to submit articles with scientific rigor; and there is a need for time lag between submission and acceptance, to ensure high quality of articles.

What we did – May 2011

Training Programs / Talks: Literature searching/ Consultative meetings

May 04 - Lecture on literature searching for Nurses - Jaslok Hospital, Mumbai

May 11 - Preconference workshop on EBM - at Medicon 2011

May 11 - Preconference workshop on Scientific Writing at Medicon 2011

May 14 - IJO - Research methodology workshop - Trivandrum

May 28 - Research methodology workshop - Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai

Document Delivery of Journal Articles

In the month of May 2011, we delivered 76 articles to individual members & libraries. The total number of documents delivered since April 2011 is 136.

Funding

The easiest way of supporting us is to become a "Friend of QMed". Do check out our website www.qmedkf.org.in for details.We accept donations by cheques in favour of Quality Medical Knowledge Foundation. You may send the cheques to our address, or you could ask us for our account details. You will get the applicable IT Exemption for donations under Section 80G of the Indian Income Tax Act.

Quote of the Month

Science may set limits to knowledge, but should not set limits to imagination.

Bertrand Russell

Thank you Dr. Urmila Thatte from KEM Hospital for sharing this quote! Dr. Thatte adds "Keep an open mind when you do research"

Directory of Indian Medical Sites (www.indianmedicalsites.in)

We have added 25 new sites in May and the total number of sites is 3325.

We invite volunteers to add new sites. If you would like to help, do write to us and we will send you a set of instructions that will make it easier for you to work. Please write "Volunteering for Indian Medical Sites" in the Subject of the email.