Online meeting hosted by SSPHPGTI, Noida in collaboration with NAMS, Delhi
16 January 2021
Report
The Super Specialty Paediatric Hospital and Postgraduate Teaching Institute, Noida organised a National Seminar on Medical Ethics under the aegis of National Academy of Medical Sciences (NAMS) on 16th January 2021 from 11:00 AM to 1.30 pm. The program was attended by NAMS council members and faculty, residents and fellows from SSPHPGTI. The meeting was chaired by Prof Ruchi Rai and Dr Satyam Arora from SSPHPGTI, Noida
The welcome address was delivered by Prof DK Gupta, Director, SSPHPGTI. Dr Gupta welcomes the delegates and spoke on the importance of Ethics in medical practice. He commented on the role of apex institutes like NAMS in upholding the role of ethics and of institutes like SSPHPGTI in integrating ethics in day-to-day patient care.
Prof S. Chooramani, Chairperson, NAMS gave the inaugural address following this. She spoke on Ethics in ancient Indian system of medicine. She spoke on the qualifications needed for a good doctor and a surgeon, code of conduct for a good teacher and a disciple and how these can be applied in today’s context.
Dr Nita Radhakrishnan, Asst Professor in Department of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology, SSPHPGTI, Noida spoke on the ethics of paediatric cancer care. She described the experience of managing , children with cancer, when and how diagnosis is to be disclosed to families and patients and what to do when ethical dilemmas are faced in cancer care. She spoke on adherence to the basic pillars of ethics for each and every decision made in clinical practice and to build a culture of evidence based ethical practice in clinical care.
Dr Satyam Arora, Asst Professor in Department of Transfusion Medicine, SSPHPGTI, Noida spoke on ethical challenges in paediatric hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. He described the application of stem cells in clinical practice and research, the difference between hematopoietic stem cell therapy and transplantation and ethical dilemmas surrounding stem cell mobilization from donors. He also spoke on ‘saviour siblings’, consent for transplantation and on approved uses of stem cell transplantation.
Dr Shilpa Sharma, Addl Professor, Department of Pediatric Surgery, AIIMS, Delhi spoke on the ethical challenges faced in children with ambiguous genitalia. She described the spectrum of ambiguous genitalia and the challenges faced in diagnosis of these children. She went on to also describe the social stigma surrounding these children, the urgent need to get psychological support for these children from professionals who are sensitive to and experienced in the care of such patients and on the need to develop a network for the same.
Dr KK Sharma, CME Coordinator, NAMS further spoke on the ethics of medical research. Dr Sharma described the basic tenets of ethics, the history of how medical ethics evolved to its current state and how it is to be applied in current medical research. He described the unethical practices which were followed during the early years of modern medicine and how these have helped us formulate guidelines for proper conduct of clinical trials.
Finally Dr Ruchi Rai, Professor, Department of Neonatology, SSPHPGTI, Noida spoke on the ethical relation between medical practitioner and pharmaceutical industry. She spoke on the guidelines issued by the regulatory bodies in our country and how this is to be implemented. She spoke also on how these rules are bypassed at times by the pharmaceutical industry and how as medical professionals we need to be wary.
Speakers further answered questions raised by the attendees both online and offline. Prof DK Gupta summarised the talks and gave his suggestions for implementing these in daily practice. The meeting was adjourned subsequently.
