Orientation Session for the Final Year Postgraduates on writing dissertation.

An Orientations Session for the benefit of the postgraduates of all departments of Narayana Medical College was organized by the Department of Medical Education, on 26 Sept, 2014, at the Demonstration Room, Dept of Anatomy. About 130 postgraduates from all departments running postgraduate courses, including the superspecialities, attended the programme.

The programme was conducted from 9 am to 1 pm, for four hours. After prayer, Dr.V.Chandrasekhar, Head of Medical Education & Coordinator of the Programme, invited the Principal and Dr.Sheriff, Professor of Surgery to speak in the inaugural function. Principal expressed his happiness that such an academic event was taking place. He advised the postgraduates to listen carefully, follow the discussions and study well. The following faculty participated as Resource Persons.

1. Dr.V.Chandrasekhar, Professor & Head of Community Medicine & Medical Education,
2. Dr.Amit Aggarwal, Professor & Head of Neuro-Surgery, and
3. Dr.B.V.Subrahmanyam, Professor  & Head of Forensic Medicine & Toxicology.

In the first session, Dr.Chandrasekhar, gave a brief overview of the topic. His discussion was focused on the different parts of the dissertation, like, Introduction, Aims & Objectives, Review of Literature, Materials & Methods, Results, Discussion, Summary and Recommendations. He discussed very briefly about each part. He discussed about the various rules and guide lines provided by the Dr. NTR University of Health Sciences.

In the second session, Dr.Aggarwal discussed about the various aspects of dissertation writing. He discussed how to write clearly, numbering of tables, figures and photographs, how present information, how to refer to the various studies, how to use the computer so that maximum benefit can be got with careful use of the modern technology,etc. He encouraged the postgraduates to participate by telling about the work they have done, how they have written, what problems they faced, etc.

In the last and final session, Dr.Subrahmanyam discussed about the acknowledgements, references and ethical aspects. He gave a very good account of writing acknowledgements. That the guide, co-guide, and all others help needs to be acknowledged. Family members need not be mentioned. Referencing now has to be as per Vancouver style only, as per UHS. He warned them about plagiarism, and dangers of cheating, etc. The programme finally came to an end at 1 pm with proposing of vote of thanks by Dr.Chandrasekhar.