Dear Colleagues,
It was nice to meet and interact with many of you during Pedicon 2007 at Mumbai. I take this opportunity to congratulate Dr. Bharat Agarwal and his team for organizing such a mega event with such a precision.
First time in history of IAP we could successfully conduct five ‘Training-of –Trainers’ (ToTs) workshops of IAP vision programs during Pedicon. All the participants were chosen after giving appeal in ‘Academy Today’ and following a transparent process of selection. After Pedicon we have already had national launchings of “Art and Science of Pediatric Practice (ASPP)” program at Gandhidham, SCOPP 2007 at Bhubneshwar and we will be soon launching ‘Poor Scholastic Performance Program’ (PSPP) and ‘Parenting Workshop’ at Surat on 25th March, 2007.
In coming months we will roll out other programs under IAP vision 2007 like ‘Adolescent Friendly School Initiative’ (AFSI), ‘Science of Vaccinology Program’, CME on ‘Problem Solving in Pediatric Infectious Diseases’ (PSPID), ‘Rational Pediatrics Therapy’ for IAP and IMA Members, ‘Asthma Training Workshops’ and ‘Safe Injection Practice Workshops’. We are also continuing with all good program of IAP Action Plan 2006 like RTIGEM, Ask IAP etc.
For child survival related activities, we have planned 16 state level and 52 sub-divisional level capacity building initiatives on ‘Comprehensive Newborn Care’ and same number of sessions on ‘Under-five Child Survival Interventions’ in states having high infant mortality rate. There will be 27 District level workshops on ‘Orientation of Private Practitioners in IMNCI’ in UP and Bihar.
Executive board (EB) has decided to actively involve all EB members and state presidents and secretaries in implementing programs under IAP vision 2007. EB has also decided to allot at least one sponsored program to all 242 IAP branches and any new branch which is started in year 2007.
Another highlight of ‘IAP Vision 2007’ is that we aim to create District Resource Persons for all important programs of IAP by the end of the year. We aim to create 600 District Immunization Resource Persons by 15 regional training of ‘Science of Vaccinology Program’, 300 District Child Rights Resource Persons by Child Rights and Protection Program (CRPP), 160 District HIV Resource Persons, and more than 150 District Resource Persons for Adolescent Friendly School Initiative.
This year we will be sending a number of ‘Desks- top Reference’ books to all 16000 IAP members. We have planned desk top reference on Computerization of Pediatric Practice, Hand Book on Pneumonia, FAQ in Immunization Practices, ABC of Asthma, Behaviour Disorders, WHO book of Hospital care for Children, Book on Medico legal issues, Student Book of IMNCI and some more.
While allocating these programs I came to know about certain facts that had disturbed me. Of the 16 states that have high infant mortality and poor infrastructure of health services there are only 80 IAP branches (in 309 districts) whereas in other 14 states having 300 districts with better child survival index there are 162 branches. So IAP is not strong where it should be. We have decided to launch a mission of “IAP Branch in Every District” and all EB members and state presidents have responded positively and we hope to start many new branches this year.
So this is the year of ‘reaching the un-reached’ as far as IAP is concerned- reaching to un-reached members, branches, and the un-reached child population who need our presence and our services the most.
Dates for a number of National Consultative Meetings have been finalized, and we will have IAP guidelines on some more important topics by the end of the year.
We have made some progress in other programs like IAP Telemedicine and Tele-education Network, IAP Manual of Administrative Procedures, Thalassemia and Rabies Prevention Programs, Golden Hour Emergency Management Course ( GEM) and Child Survival Communication. We have made progress in strengthening our relations with international associations. We have successfully conducted ‘IAP-IPA International Workshop on Child Health and Environment’ at Delhi in February and we had a useful meeting with Executive Director of International Pediatric Association and hope to arrange more programs with IPA in India. In March we had a fruitful meeting with International Coordinator of RCPCH and we hope to finalize modalities for training of our members in sub-specialities subjects in UK in coming months. We also hope to get Child Protection training material developed by RCPCH which will help us in developing our own training material for regional training in child rights and protection program. We are also preparing a blue print for sub-speciality training in our country.
Talks are underway to arrange IAP-AAP and INDO-UK CME on Hot Topics in Pediatrics.I have been invited by Japan Pediatrics Society and American Pediatric Society/Society for Pediatric Research to participate in their annual meetings.
I am fortunate to have Dr.RK Agarwal as President-Elect and Dr.Ajay Gambhir as Vice-President, both of them are helping me immensely in all IAP related activities in best of their capacities. I am also very pleased to have Dr. Deepak Ugra as Honorary .Secretary General. All of you will agree with me that IAP office is now responding to all mails/queries at the speed of thought. I thank them for making my dream of ‘IAP@ Speed of Thought’ a reality. I had promised during my lecture on E-Pediatrics in Pedicon to reply your email within one hour and I am happy that I could fulfil my promise till now.
I got more calls on my cell during the last three months than probably the entire years since I started using this modern-day gadget. Those who had ranged me would testify that I’d not disappointed them. Please feel free to call me anytime from anywhere as this year of my life is solely devoted for the cause of the organization and those representing it. My philosophy is simple and can aptly be summarized in the following lines,
“If a task has once begun. Never leave it till it's done.
Be the labour great or small. Do it well or not at all. -Anon.”
Looking forward to receive your critical feedback. |
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