Annual Conference · 2024

AIMCON 2024: A single day, a wider conversation

MERF’s second national annual conference compressed two days of clinical exchange into one — a tighter format, the same conviction that comprehensive care doesn’t respect specialty boundaries.

The 2nd National Annual Conference of the Medical Education and Research Foundation gathered at the Triple Crown Hotel in Bettiah on 9th June 2024. Where the inaugural edition had spread across two days, AIMCON 2024 was structured as a single intensive day — opening with hands-on resuscitation training in the morning and rolling straight into a full clinical programme through the afternoon and evening.

The conference also marked a structural milestone for MERF. With Dr Gunjan K. Bhagwat now serving as President of the Foundation, the organising committee was led by Dr Ashok Kumar (Organizing Chairman) and Dr Aloka Chandan (Organizing Secretary), with Dr Arvind Kumar as Co-Secretary and Dr Amitabh Chaudhary as Convener.

Morning · BLS & ACLS workshop

The day opened at 8 a.m. with a Basic Life Support and Advanced Cardiac Life Support workshop, conducted by AHA-accredited instructors from AIIMS New Delhi. Sessions moved briskly through pocket mask and bag-mask device technique, single- and two-rescuer adult BLS, child and infant BLS, pregnancy resuscitation, basic and advanced airway management, defibrillator use, team dynamics, and the cardiac arrest algorithm.

Faculty included Dr Md. Sabah Siddiqui (AIIMS Raipur), Dr Arvind Kumar (AIIMS New Delhi), Dr Kumar Saurabh (GMCH Bettiah), and instructors Mr Neeraj Kumar Swarnkar and Mr Vikram Singh Choudhary from AIIMS New Delhi. The morning closed with skill stations, with seats limited and allotted on a first-come basis.

Afternoon · Three oration awards, eleven specialties

The main CME programme introduced something new — a set of named oration awards anchoring the academic schedule. Three were delivered:

• Maharshi Valmiki Oration Award 2024: Antimicrobial stewardship in general practice — Dr Deepak Kumar, AIIMS Jodhpur
• Dr Sushil Prasad Chaudhary Oration Award 2024: Osteoporosis diagnosis and treatment — Dr Satyajeet Nandkeolyar, Bettiah
• Sri Pracheta Oration Award 2024: Recurrent pregnancy loss — Dr Gunjan K Bhagwat, Bettiah and New Delhi

The full programme threaded across preventive and family medicine, paediatrics, radiology and pharmacology, obstetrics and gynaecology, internal medicine and its subspecialties, surgery and urosurgery, orthopaedics, and dental sciences. Sessions covered everything from mandatory adult immunisation and rational beta-blocker use, to the management of MDR and XDR tuberculosis, IV fluid selection, recurrent UTIs from the urosurgical angle, and tendinopathy — each pitched at the practitioner who needs to recognise, refer, or manage at the first point of contact.

Faculty came from AIIMS New Delhi, AIIMS Patna, AIIMS Raipur, AIIMS Jodhpur, NMCH Patna, Medanta Patna, GMCH Bettiah, and consultants based in Singapore, Delhi NCR, and across Bihar.

Looking back

AIMCON 2024 proved that a tighter format could carry the same weight. Trainees walked away certified, the oration awards added a layer of academic gravity that the conference will carry forward, and Bettiah hosted another round of conversations that wouldn’t have happened anywhere else.

Our thanks to the patrons — Dr Sushil P. Chaudhary, Dr N. N. Shahi, Dr K S Jha, Dr Pramod Tiwari, and Dr Dilip Kumar — to Organizing Chairman Dr Ashok Kumar, Organizing Secretary Dr Aloka Chandan, and to every faculty member, chairperson, delegate, and volunteer who made the day possible.

AIMCON returns annually. Watch the Events section for upcoming editions.