HYDERABAD: The tenth edition of OSMECON, one of Hyderabad’s most celebrated conferences for under-graduate medical students, came to a jubilant close on Saturday, with over 2,000 student delegates participating from across India and countries including Nepal, Russia and Ukraine. The conference was inaugurated via video conferencing by a notable doctor and the former Director-General of ICMR, Dr Soumya Swaminathan, who is now chief scientist at the World Health Organization, Geneva. Speaking about the thrust areas of both the WHO and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), she advised the students to familiarise themselves with the ground realities in the lives of people coming to primary healthcare centres.
The three-day conference was flagged-off on Thursday was fun with a creativity-inducing mix of debates, research presentations, poetry, poster-making and skill-based workshops. The themes chosen for OSMECON were in alignment with the WHO (global) and ICMR-DHR (national) thrust areas, while also exploring the latest frontiers of scientific endeavours globally. Ranging from ethics-based debates about over-the-counter nootropics to painting individual ideas of quantum biology, students presented a cocktail of technical knowledge with artistic liberty.
Dr Prakash Baba Amte and Dr Mandakini Amte who graced the event as guests of honour came all the way from their village, Hemalkasa in Gadchiroli, despite heavy rains and flood. The story of their lifelong commitment towards the healthcare needs of the tribal people of Maharashtra received a standing ovation. Dr Prakash highlighted the roots of medicine as being in the provision of holistic care to individuals and the instructions he got from his father — “work with the people not for the people”. Dr Mandakini spoke about the lessons they had learnt from the tribals.
Explaining the humble beginnings of the conference, the convenor, Dr Pari Plavi, said, “In the year 2010, a few students and I, then Professor of Anatomy at Osmania Medical College, set out to start a small conference to provide a common area for undergraduate medical students to learn research methodologies, to present their research work and to exchange ideas.
This was the beginning of OSMECON, which started with the participation of three or four medical colleges from the combined state of Andhra Pradesh.”
The final event, a medical symposium, drew a huge crowd that cheered for their respective teams battling it out for the grand prize. From presentations on topics such as nanotechnology to treat cancer to bio-printing organs to tackle the shortage of organs, the symposium presentation kept the audience enraptured.