ISC delegation from Iran visits CPSP Regional Center Lahore.

Dr. M. J. Dehghani President Islamic World Science Citation Center and Dr.Ali Ghazni Vice President of Regional Information Center for Science and Technology from ISC in Shiraz from Islamic Republic of Iran visited the Regional Center of College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan on October 24, 2016 during their recent visit to Pakistan. They were accompanied by Prof. Maj.Gen. Mohammad Aslam Vice Chancellor of University of Health Sciences, Mr. Shaukat Ali Jawaid Chief Editor of Professional Medical Publications who was co-coordinating their visit to Pakistan. On reaching the CPSP Campus the delegation was received by Prof. Khalid Masood Gondal Director Regional Center and Senior Vice President of CPSP.

Prof. Khalid Masood Gondal in his presentation discussed at length the Residency training programme of the CPSP, the salient features of the e Log system which it has introduced and the monitoring of trainees and supervisors. He also highlighted the CPSP accomplishments so far and laid emphasis on the quality of training being imparted, transparency in the examination system wherein overseas examiners are also invited to act as external examiners. After sighing Memorandum of Understanding with Royal Colleges of UK and medical universities in Saudi Arabia, the CPSP was sending its Fellows for two years training in these countries and thus they are exposed to the state of the art healthcare, teaching and training facilities. CPSP, it was further stated has provided over 90% of the specialists working in the country and it has earned international recognition.

Prof. J. Holland, President of Australasian College of Surgeons from Australia which is combined college of Australia and New Zealand recently visited Lahore as an overseas examiner and commended the competency of candidates and quality of training programme run and managed by the CPSP. The standard of examination was at par with international standards which he has witnessed while examining candidates overseas, he remarked.

Dr. Javed Dehghani in his brief comments introduced the ISC and its functions which include documenting and preserving in the database the research and publications in the Islamic World in the multidisciplinary field which covers from Agriculture to Engineering, Medical and Health Sciences, Information Technology, Business, Economics, etc. It is an extremely useful database for the researchers and managers besides government institutions.

Dr. Ali Gazni made a presentation and highlighted how the ISC was documenting, preserving and ranking the research and publications from the Islamic World. He also showed some very useful data which they had prepared relating to five universities of Lahore I.e University of Punjab, University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore University of Management Sciences, University of Lahore and University of Health Sciences'. He also showed the number of publications from the Muslim world and its comparison with Pakistan. The ranking and citation from Pakistan was also compared with other countries which showed that Pakistan has made tremendous progress in Research and Science publications over the last ten years.

Prof. Mohamamd Iqbal from Sheikh Zayed Hospital who is also Dean Faculty of Surgery at CPSP highlighted the salient features of the MCQ Bank they have developed. A good MCQ Bank, he opined, was essential for good examination. CPSP is also planning to introduce a new Fellowship in Surgical Oncology for which lot of preliminary work has been done and the faculty was currently going through its curriculum. We hope to start this Fellowship examination from early next year. We are trying to standardize the training and Work Place based assessment. Competency of the trainees is assessed by the examiners through direct observation of their clinical skills.

Prof. Riaz Warraich from King Edward Medical University said that CPSP runs seven fellowship programmes in oral and maxillofacial surgery and their duration is from three to five years. They are also working in the field of Head and Neck oncology. Visiting delegation from Iran was immensely impressed with the functioning and standard maintained by CPSP and wished to have more fruitful collaboration in the days to come. They also invited the CPSP delegation to visit ISC Headquarters in Shiraz Iran to see the facilities available. Later Prof. Khalid Masood Gondal and Dr. Javed Dehghani also presented mementoes to each other on behalf of their respective institutions. The meeting concluded with a dinner reception hosted by the CPSP.