The theme of the conference was “An ode to health: charting the course, navigating the future”
School of Health Systems Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai recently organised a hugely successful 22nd national health conference titled “Clairvoyance” on December 7-8, 2019 at its convention centre.
While the previous versions of the conference had a great response, this one was an even bigger draw. More than 650 delegates from around the globe participated with a healthy professional to student ratio of 2:3. Noted specialists in the field from different parts of the country shared their expertise and presented insights into the global health scenario.
This year the theme of the conference was “An ode to health: charting the course, navigating the future.” Through this ode to health the conference focussed to lay out a plan or course which helped to build diverse frameworks and to ignite inspiration for system-wide success. This revolutionary paradigm acted as a definitive guide to navigate the future.
The conference was designed to discuss and develop effective and efficient approaches to meet the demands of patients and to utilise recent advancements and research for better healthcare.
The scientific, practitioner, administrator and professional-oriented and educational sessions were presented to highlight technological advancements, operational efficiency, innovations and build up the creative skills, with discussions on the numerous challenges faced for the overall benefit of public health.
The first day of the conference started with a mesmerising cultural performance by the students of School of Disability Studies, TISS. Prof Shalini Bharat, Director, TISS and Prof Anil Kumar, Dean, School of Health Systems Studies, TISS addressed the August gathering by their words of wisdom.
The chief guest of the event was Dr Nitin Madan Kulkarni, Secretary, Department of Health, Medical Education and Family Welfare, Govt of Jharkhand. The keynote talk on “Leadership in Healthcare” was delivered by Prof Anupam Sibal, Group Medical Director, Apollo Hospitals Group. Leading the talks on the theme of the conference were Dr Prashanta Tripathy, Dr JN Srivastava, Dr Viduthalai Virumbi Balagurusamy, Mohammad Ameel, Dr Aquinas Edassery, Dr Evita Fernandez, Prof KS James, Prof (Dr) PM Bhujang and Nagendra Kumar to name a few.
The session on “Technology in healthcare: the tipping point” discussed the challenges of data integration, adaptation to new technology and the patient’s involvement in their own treatment. This session cogitate upon the most promising technologies like AI, IoMT, virtual reality, Blockchain and chat-bots among others to streamline healthcare procedures and systems. The session “UHC for India: myth or reality” discussed the key facets of India’s healthcare sector, analysed the reasons underlying its inability to meet UHC goals at present, and proposed solutions to fill health delivery gaps in a more efficient, transparent, equitable and sustainable way. It also discussed that how with the introduction of Ayushman Bharat, the UHC dream has the potential to become the cornerstone of the country’s healthcare system.
The panel discussions by the eminent dignitaries of healthcare paved a way to open newer opportunities of inquisitiveness. In the discussion on “Health services operations: a see-saw game between innovation and efficiency” various optimisation models were highlighted to deal with the inefficiency and the bottlenecks in the healthcare system. In the session “climate change: changing weather, withering health”, a horror story by the moderator Neeta Ganguly posed a frightening question in front of the panellists i.e. how the human-made health stressors, are threatening the human health and well-being in numerous ways. This session helped in connecting our understanding of how climate is changing with an understanding of how those changes may affect population health and further help in making informed decisions about mitigating the amount of future climate change, suggest priorities for protecting public health, and help identify research needs.
On the second day of the conference the panel discussion of “Health legislations and policies: fingers crossed” addressed need for a contemporary framework which will appropriately use modern legal tools for complex health challenges. Prof (Dr) PM Bhujang, moderator for the session opened the discussion to how health sector is seen through the legislative lens with the new legislation and policies like the NMC bill, Ayushman Bharat, National Health Policy, Clinical Establishment Act, Mental Healthcare Act, National Food Security Act and so forth. The panel discussion on “Human Resources Management: a herculean task” discussed current approaches in human resources which suggest number of weaknesses including a reactive, ad hoc attitude towards problems of human resources; hiring shortages; higher turnover and brain drain; increased burn-outs; workforce migration; quality training and unaddressed inclusion of diversity. It highlighted to navigate the ways out by deploying right tools and how to be the partners to practitioners.
Various competitions including paper presentation (theme: social determinants of health), poster competition (theme: antibiotics resistance), essay writing (theme: gender, sexuality and mental health), business model (theme: value based healthcare), quiz competition and extempore competition witnessed an active participation from students from different management, public health, medical and social sciences institutions.
The guest of honour for the event Dr (Lt General Retd) Manomoy Ganguly delivered the Valedictory session followed by the vote of thanks by student coordinators.
The conference was spearheaded by the Clairvoyance Committee-2019 under the able stewardship of Dr Feroz Ikbal, the faculty coordinator.