Wednesday, 14 March
Another day in Taipei. As always, I had egg and fruits for brekky, then headed down to the lobby. We then caught a cab to go to NTUHICC (National Taiwan University Hospital International Convention Center), the place where the symposium was held.
This morning we had another parallel session of personal presentation on medical research, medical humanities, and public health policy. I attended the first half of medical research session ‘cos I wanted to see Milena’s and Susan’s presentations. Milena was a girl from Serbia and Susan was another participant from Melbourne University. Milena presented her research on expression of cell cycle protein on Wilms tumor, while Susan presented her AMS research project: physicians’ observance to ED asthma guidelines at National Taiwan University Hospital. After they had done theirs, I quickly moved to medical humanities session because I wanted to hear Byongsung’s presentation about the shift of mental health paradigm.
After that, we had discussion forum about the physician-scientist-MD training and medical research. We talked about the importance of doctor’s roles as a physician and scientist. The roles were particularly important in translating scientific research to clinical practice. We also shared about the opportunity to conduct research in our medical schools. This particularly related to the structure of medical curriculum in each school. I started to appreciate the fact that Melbourne University integrated a one-year research training into medical curriculum. I realized how rare this opportunity was in other medical schools. We finished the discussion at around lunch time.
The next activity was a visit to Tzu Chi Foundation. Tzu Chi foundation was a non-profit organization established by Master Cheng Yen about 40 years ago in 1966. Master Chen Yen was a Buddhist who wanted to do something to relieve the suffering of unfortunate people in the world.
Master Cheng Yen had this particular philosophy: There’s no one in this world I don’t know, there’s no one in this world I don’t love, and there’s no one in this world I don’t forgive.
She started to raise fund by making and selling baby shoes.
She did this with few housewives. The organization had now been very big. It had over 5 million volunteers and had helped many communities internationally. Through its charity works Tzu Chi Foundation had been able to build many hospitals, establish medical schools, and provide aid relief for communities suffering from natural disasters.
One particular thing that it had done was establishing a hospital in the impoverished east coast of Taiwan. Master Cheng Yen used to look after the poor and sick people there. She realized how scarce medical resources there. So, she was determined to build a hospital in east Taiwan so that the poor people could receive medical treatment for free. The community contributed to the establishment of this hospital, even if it was only for putting a brick on the construction. I guess this was a smart way to create a sense of ownership of the hospital among the community members. It was also very inspiring to learn how her genuine intention had attracted some dedicated doctors to practice in that hospital. East Taiwan was certainly not a popular place for doctors to work.
It was a very inspiring tour for me. While learning about Tzu Chi Foundation and its charitable activities, I remembered about my (and some of my friends’) dream to build Free Medical Clinic in Indonesia. If one master Cheng Yen could do that, so could us. Bismillah….
Tzu Chi Foundation was quite far from the convention center. It took about 50 minutes to get there. I was glad that I prayed Dzuhur and Ashr prayer before I went there, because by the time we got back to the convention center, it was already approaching maghrib time.
As usual, at night time we had ‘exploring Taipei’ tour. This time we visited Shilin Night Market. It was the
largest night market in Taipei. There were various food, clothing stores, and accessory stands. I went there with Helen, Zoe, Alicia, Elina, Kevin, Mariama, Abdou, Bully, and Miniru. They helped me to find food that I could eat. They also translated the menu for me! :). I was very grateful for this. And so, I tried red bean cake which reminded me to ‘dorayaki’ from Japan and sliced ice cream with strawberry toppings.
This morning we had another parallel session of personal presentation on medical research, medical humanities, and public health policy. I attended the first half of medical research session ‘cos I wanted to see Milena’s and Susan’s presentations. Milena was a girl from Serbia and Susan was another participant from Melbourne University. Milena presented her research on expression of cell cycle protein on Wilms tumor, while Susan presented her AMS research project: physicians’ observance to ED asthma guidelines at National Taiwan University Hospital. After they had done theirs, I quickly moved to medical humanities session because I wanted to hear Byongsung’s presentation about the shift of mental health paradigm.
After that, we had discussion forum about the physician-scientist-MD training and medical research. We talked about the importance of doctor’s roles as a physician and scientist. The roles were particularly important in translating scientific research to clinical practice. We also shared about the opportunity to conduct research in our medical schools. This particularly related to the structure of medical curriculum in each school. I started to appreciate the fact that Melbourne University integrated a one-year research training into medical curriculum. I realized how rare this opportunity was in other medical schools. We finished the discussion at around lunch time.
The next activity was a visit to Tzu Chi Foundation. Tzu Chi foundation was a non-profit organization established by Master Cheng Yen about 40 years ago in 1966. Master Chen Yen was a Buddhist who wanted to do something to relieve the suffering of unfortunate people in the world.
Master Cheng Yen had this particular philosophy: There’s no one in this world I don’t know, there’s no one in this world I don’t love, and there’s no one in this world I don’t forgive.She started to raise fund by making and selling baby shoes.
She did this with few housewives. The organization had now been very big. It had over 5 million volunteers and had helped many communities internationally. Through its charity works Tzu Chi Foundation had been able to build many hospitals, establish medical schools, and provide aid relief for communities suffering from natural disasters.One particular thing that it had done was establishing a hospital in the impoverished east coast of Taiwan. Master Cheng Yen used to look after the poor and sick people there. She realized how scarce medical resources there. So, she was determined to build a hospital in east Taiwan so that the poor people could receive medical treatment for free. The community contributed to the establishment of this hospital, even if it was only for putting a brick on the construction. I guess this was a smart way to create a sense of ownership of the hospital among the community members. It was also very inspiring to learn how her genuine intention had attracted some dedicated doctors to practice in that hospital. East Taiwan was certainly not a popular place for doctors to work.
It was a very inspiring tour for me. While learning about Tzu Chi Foundation and its charitable activities, I remembered about my (and some of my friends’) dream to build Free Medical Clinic in Indonesia. If one master Cheng Yen could do that, so could us. Bismillah….
Tzu Chi Foundation was quite far from the convention center. It took about 50 minutes to get there. I was glad that I prayed Dzuhur and Ashr prayer before I went there, because by the time we got back to the convention center, it was already approaching maghrib time.
As usual, at night time we had ‘exploring Taipei’ tour. This time we visited Shilin Night Market. It was the
largest night market in Taipei. There were various food, clothing stores, and accessory stands. I went there with Helen, Zoe, Alicia, Elina, Kevin, Mariama, Abdou, Bully, and Miniru. They helped me to find food that I could eat. They also translated the menu for me! :). I was very grateful for this. And so, I tried red bean cake which reminded me to ‘dorayaki’ from Japan and sliced ice cream with strawberry toppings.
posted by erika @ 2:07 am
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