QMedCONNECT Newsletter: January 2016

Dear friends

We are happy to present the first newsletter of 2016. There are several interesting happenings in the context of research and publications. Many of you maybe aware of the Medical Council of India's fairly recent communication about which journals would be considered by them, for promotions. This communication created some confusion. Several academicians discussed this issue and a representative group published an article giving a set of recommendations to re-create these guidelines, removing the confusion. The interesting part is that this article has been carried in 22 journals, with all editors agreeing about the simultaneous publication. (And may be published in more journals in the near future). I wonder if this kind of simultaneous publication is unique in the history of publishing!

The year began with a wonderful event for QMed - MECOR 2016, where we did much more than just teach literature searching. I also attended and spoke at an event - KRM 2016 - conducted at the Tata Memorial Hospital, where there was a buzz of discussions about copyright. It is wonderful seeing so much happen about publications and research!

Vasumathi Sriganesh

QMed@MECOR 2016 - "Can't think of MECOR without QMed", says Sonia Buist, Director ATS MECOR

The year 2016 started on a high note for QMed. Vasumathi Sriganesh was a faculty at MECOR (Methods in Epidemiological, Clinical and Operations Research) 2016 - an event organized by the American Thoracic Society, in India and developing countries. In addition to a lecture, she mentored nine participants by helping them do an exhaustive literature search for their research topics. Dr Sonia Buist - Director - ATS MECOR program, and Dr Jerry Krishnan - MECOR India Course Director kept on emphasizing the importance of proper searching, to the participants.

Do read more about the event in our blog post.

Did You Know

Resource: Therapeutic Guidelines - http://www.tg.org.au/

Therapeutic Guidelines is a resource from Australia. It has a set of guidelines on several topics, written principally for prescribers (general practitioners and trainee physicians in particular) to provide clear, practical, succinct and up-to-date therapeutic information, for the management of patients with specific conditions. They cover all common disorders seen in clinical practice. Topics and sections are arranged according to diagnostic entities. Each section gives sufficient surrounding information to orient the reader, followed by succinct and explicit recommendations for therapy. The website specifies that the Guidelines are not primarily meant to instruct, but rather to assist prescribers ensure their patients receive optimum treatment. If one does not need the whole database, then one could get books on specific specialty guidelines.

Therapeutic Guidelines Limited (TGL) is an independent not-for-profit organisation. Its aim is to promote the quality use of medicines.

Interesting Reading

Indian Association of Medical Journal Editors, Aggarwal R, Gogtay N, Kumar R, Sahni P. The Revised Guidelines of the Medical Council of India for Academic Promotions: Need for a Rethink.
Indian Pediatr. 2016 Jan 8;53(1):23-26

This article is simultaneously published in about 22 journals, but since we came across it first in the Indian Pediatrics, we have chosen this citation to share this article. The article covers five areas where the MCI has issued guidelines and made practical suggestions for each area - a) Where should the journals be indexed, b) Types of articles that would be considered, c) Better understanding of the terms - National and International journals, d) Authorship and e) E-Journals - clarifying what should be acceptable and what cannot - eg - predatory journals. We do hope that the MCI accepts the revisions suggested, as they have been documented with lots of thoughts and discussions.

From QMed’s Calendar

Talks/Consultative Meetings on Literature Search, Referencing, Citing;

1. Indian Journal of Ophthalmology (IJO) : About 12 participants attended this session. All of them (by a show of hands) indicated that they learned about MeSH (a thesaurus in PubMed) in this session and agreed that they needed hands on training for better learning.

2. MECOR 2016 : Sonia Buist - Director ATS MECOR says "We cannot think of doing MECOR in India without you"!

3. LTMMC (Sion Hospital): There were 38 participants - four faculty and the rest - PG students. Again - all of them gave the same feedback as in the IJO program

4. KRM 2016 - Lecture on "Copyright Clearance Centres, and Managing Copyright while supporting Full Text Requests"