First ever Multicenter Live Surgery Workshop and International CME conducted on an e-platform at Kochi

E – MISCON – SELSI South Zone Conference 2020 was successfully conducted on 17 & 18 July, 2020 by the department of General & Laparoscopic Surgery, VPS Lakeshore Hospital Kochi in association with Society of Endoscopic and Laparoscopic Surgeons of India (SELSI), Verwandeln Institute Kochi, Keyhole Clinic Kochi, Indian Hernia Society (IHS) and Association of Surgeons of India Kerala Chapter.

The pandemic of Covid -19 had put a full stop for the Continuing Medical Education programmes and Surgical training through Live Surgical Workshops all across globe, since March 2020. MISCON – the international Minimally Invasive Surgery Conference, an yearly event had been scheduled to be conducted from 17 to 19 July, 2020. As the initial preparations was completed and delegates had started registering but unfortunately, the Covid 19 pandemic came in and it bothered the organizers regarding the conduct of the event.

The team at Verwandeln Institute for Laparoscopic training at Kochi thought of an innovative idea to proceed with the conduct of the conference on an e-platform. As it was for the first time ever in history, there was no proper guidance or reference.

All the programmes were charted out with buffer, as Covid threat was a deep concern, even on the day of the event. But with team work and planning we could conduct the conference excellently in a unique manner. Strict adherence to Covid protocols including RT PCR testing for all the team members were done to ensure safety.

The team behind this initiative confirmed E-MISCON was a grant success. It was 25 hours of rich scientific content of two days.  This historic event of first ever Multicenter Live Operative Workshop and International CME on an  e-platform was absolutely new to all, across the globe. It had more than 500 Surgeons, Gynaecologists, Urologists form different parts of the world participating in the event. Additionally, 5 Medical colleges viewed the event as a group in their lecture halls.

35 invited videos both national and international, 3 Orations, 14 Live surgeries from 7 hospitals of different parts of the country, 150 faculty, e-posters, virtual trade exhibitions, e-inauguration and e-convocation for FLHS were delivered. The Live Workshops were of very high standards, both in quality of procedures and clarity of projection. The lectures, videos & orations were also of very high academic level. It was beyond the imagination of the whole team when they conceived and executed.  The effort of the team was appreciated globally as the team received lot of feedbacks as emails, whatsapp and sms from many faculty and delegates.

It has given a new lease of thought for holding training programmes and educational events in surgical field. There was an oration on ‘Surgical education during Covid Era’ by Dr Pawanindra Lal, Executive Director of the National Board of Examinations New Delhi. Vice Chancellors of various Universities and Deans of Medical Colleges discussed the issues in detail and shared their views. Other highlights were orations by Dr M Vijaykumar, Vice Chancellor of Yenepoya University Mangalore on ‘Robotics in Oncosurgery’ and another oration by Dr M C Mishra, Vice Chancellor of MG University, Jaipur on ‘Minimally Invasive Surgery in Covid era’.

“The deliberations and surgical training helped the practicing surgeons and PGs in updating their knowledge and skills which ultimately will be beneficial to their patients for excellent outcomes. The positive outcome of the MISCON will be a bench mark for holding similar conferences. It will reduce the conference expense to one tenth of the regular ones. Participation was more as delegates didn’t have to travel or spend for stay. Time saving also was an additional advantage”, said Dr R Padmakumar, Organizing Chairman and his team.