Dear fellow academicians; the just concluded
PEDICON at Gurgaon must have rejuvenated and satisfied the satiety
of your ever-demanding grey cells. You must have enjoyed along with
academics, socio-cultural extravaganza, maybe a family holiday in
the foggy-chilly mornings at Gurgaon. By now you must have adapted
back to your routine office/hospital practice taking care of the
tiny-tots.
For those who could not attend PEDICON for varied
reasons, it was definitely one of the best, professionally managed,
scientifically rich conference par excellence. Few
innovations were tried which proved to be fruitful. Theme based
IAP-AAP CME for academicians, essential CME for practitioners, a PG
CME exclusively for exam going postgraduates and another CME for
those who aim and strive to expand their wings as entrepreneurs. The
main conference was studded with more and more "Interactive
sessions", "Ask the experts", "Dialogues", "Debates",
"Case-Scenarios" and "Keypad Sessions" rather than monologues which
were applauded by one and all.
The theme of the conference was unique "Nurture
with care – Save the girl child." It is a matter of shame that
female feticide is still rampant in our country, resulting in gender
disparity. As custodians of child health, it is the fundamental duty
of all the pediatricians to care for and save the girl child and
also prevent prenatal sex determination tests.
One of the many programs and projects envisaged
under IAP Presidential Action Plan 2012 ‘Color Atlas Of Pediatrics’
was the most cherished dream project of mine which got realized and
released during PEDICON. This masterpiece creation of international
class has been very artfully crafted into a pictorial catalogue,
covering almost the entire Pediatric science in its fold, probably
first of its kind in the world. It has undoubtedly become an
academic asset for IAP. I am indeed indebted and grateful to the
contributors, 36 section editors, 7 editorial board members and of
course the editor-in-chief, veteran Dr A Parthasarathy, who is the
main architect of this project. This color atlas would be a ready
reckoner for practicing pediatricians, a library companion for
academicians and very useful for the postgraduate students. My
heartfelt thanks go to Jaypee Publication House for engineering this
publication within a very short time of six months.
Apart from CAP, another very important book
released was "Advances in Pediatrics" published by the organizers of
PEDICON under the editorship of Dr Anupam Sachdev. Few other very
good books included the one on ‘Disability’ by Dr Anju Aggarwal and
‘Nephrology’ by Dr Anand Vasudev. The 5