JSCOR fellow organizes seminar in India

JSCOR fellow Dr. Neeraja Nagarajan helped organize a research seminar and workshop in India recently. The two-day seminar was focused on introducing young physicians, early in their training, to the basics of biomedical research. The seminar was attended by 62 medical and dental residents at the Sri Ramachandra University (SRU), Chennai, India, on 18th and 19th August 2015. Dr. Varshini Varadaraj and Dr. Neeraja Nagarajan, both alumni of SRU and currently postdoctoral fellows at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, conducted the seminar. Drs. Varadaraj and Nagarajan are members of the Diaspora Health Network (DHN), an organization founded by students at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health to strengthen the ability of local communities and their diaspora to form partnerships to address local health needs

Dr. Sunil Solomon (SRU and Johns Hopkins alumnus and currently Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins) and Dr. Eric Schneider (Johns Hopkins alumnus, former co-director of JSCOR, and faculty at the Center for Surgery and Public Health, Brigham and Women's Hospital) were guest lecturers at the seminar. The Dean of Research at SRU, the Dean of Faculties, and other prominent faculty members inaugurated the event.

The seminar consisted of talks on important areas of research, video presentations from faculty at Johns Hopkins, panel discussions with faculty from SRU and guest speakers, as well as a hands-on workshop where the students worked in teams to formulate a research question and present a proposal. A pre- and post-seminar survey was conducted to assess the impact of the seminar as well as to identify areas to concentrate on for further seminars. DHN will be conducting follow-up seminars and workshops in SRU and other medical institutions in India, Nepal and other countries to help develop local research capacity.