Department of Surgery
Every year 5 students are enrolled for Post Graduate training in General Surgery. Among the outgoing residents, at the end of 3 years, we assess them for the ‘Best Resident Award’. We judge their performance vis a vis their sincerity in ward work, their communication skills with patients as well as their colleagues, their academic performance in various internal assessment exams as well as the surgical skills they have acquired in these 3 years. A proforma is given to all the faculty members and a secret ballot is conducted in selecting the Best Resident.
We at Department of General Surgery regularly invite eminent persons in our field for delivering Guest Lectures to our students. In 2018, we invited the ASI President Dr. P. Raghuram for a lecture on Communication Skills and Dr. Tamonas Choudhari, a renowned surgeon from Kolkata, for a lecture on Electrocautery in surgery.
Department of General Surgery also conducts Live Workshops for value added education of our students every year. We conducted ‘Hernia Workshop’ in 2018 where Dr. Ramesh Punjani from Mumbai, Dr. Pramod Shinde from Nashik and our own Head of Dept. Dr. Sudhir Bhamre demonstrated Open as well as Laparoscopic Inguinal and Ventral Hernia Repair surgeries.
We also conducted an Upper GI Endoscopy Workshop in 2019 under the able guidance of the renowned laparoscopic Surgeon and Endoscopist Dr. Roy Patankar from Mumbai which was open to our students as well as all practicing consultants.
Department of General Surgery has a dedicated You Tube Channel where the faculty can upload videos of interesting and rare cases that they handle in their clinical practice.
We in the Department, also undertake Public Education drives as part of our social obligation. Last year in the month of March, we conducted a symposium on ‘ Breast Cancer Awareness’ for the general public which was attended by a large number of relevant audience. We also had a similar initiative about ‘Head Injury Awareness’ this year.
In addition, our PG students regularly take part in outreach camps in rural areas thus improving the health care facilities of the needy population in such areas.
Thus we ensure that a comprehensive training programme is available to our PG students which will help them become a complete clinician and skilled surgeon.
Title of Practice:
1. BEST RESIDENT AWARD
Objectives
- The purpose behind having such an award is to instil a competitive spirit amongst the residents so that they work hard to improve their own performance. This in turn also improves the patient care that is offered and inculcates good clinical practices in the minds of these budding specialists right in the beginning of their carriers.
The Context Or Challenging Issues
- The challenge was that the assessment was an ongoing process over the period of 3 years rather than as a One Day Examination. It’s but natural that each resident goes through ups and downs in their performance, some were good starters, some good finishers, some featured well in acquiring surgical skills whereas some had better patient rapport. Faculty had to keep this in mind while assessing.
The Practice
We tried to judge the students on following aspects of their work:
- Sincerity and efficiency in ward work
- Their caring nature towards patients
- Communication skills with patients, colleagues and seniors
- Academic performance in various internal assessment examinations
- Hands on surgical skills
A proforma was given to all the faculty members and a secret ballot was conducted in selecting the Best Resident.
Evidence Of Success
- Residents were found to improve their overall performance and they seem to be working harder to bag the coveted prize.
Problems Encountered and Resources Required
- Faculty had to keep in mind that this is an assessment of the residents’ performance over 3 years and not just on any particular day or posting.
Title of Practice:
2. BREAST CANCER AWARENESS PROGRAMME
OBJECTIVES
- This is part of social obligation. Public Education is the goal as Breast Cancer is very easily detected in early stages if awareness about this disease is created.
THE CONTEXT
- Lot of awkwardness in the minds of ladies regarding openly discussing this issue exists in our society. Whether they will enthusiastically participate in a panel discussion remained to be seen.
THE PRACTICE
- A panel of experts in the subject was created to address the audience. Question and Answer format was chosen to effectively deliver the message. Two anchors selected common questions in the minds of the public to ask the panelists. Desired information about the subject was delivered through the discussion between anchors and panelists. A large public gathering hall was selected as the venue for this symposium. Publicity of the event was done through Community Radio, Personal invitations and News paper news for the target audience.
- Master of the ceremony saw that the entire programme with arrival of dignitaries, actual panel discussion and lastly the audience participation in the form of their quarries was conducted smoothly. We also had a Poster making competition on the said subject and we exhibited the posters on the venue. Guest of Honor for the programme was the judge for this competition and we announced the winners during the programme.
EVIDENCE OF SUCCESS
- Ladies actively participated by asking many queries to the panelists. Overall the programme was a success in alleviating fears about Cancer of Breast and clearing some myths about the disease.
PROBLEMS ENCOUNTERED & RESOURCES REQUIRED
- We thought that a lot more audience could have participated in a fantastic activity like this. Never anybody could have met eminent specialists in the field at a given time on a single platform.
- We all felt that we should have published the event more aggressively so as to attract more foot fall for the event.
- More financial resources for better News Paper coverage and a separate publicity team could have raised the attendance many fold on this important public health issue.