The Third International eHealth Conference 2012, Pakistan

I presented my first ever research paper at the Third International eHealth Conference 2012 organized by the eHealth Association of Pakistan.
It was extremely fitting that Dr. Burke was the co-author of my first paper, since I wouldnt have got to do any of these things if not for him anyway.
The entire effort was spearheaded by Glen McCallum, who is a great source of inspiration, and always gives me excellent advice.
The conference website can be found here.
Basically, this was the third eHealth conference to be held.
It was held at the city of Lahore on the 21st and 22nd of January. I travelled to Lahore via India.

My flight plan was something like this -
Colombo -> Delhi -> Amritsar
From Amritsar take the bus across the border, and arrived at Lahore.
The return journey was also similar (with a few hiccups)

Planning the journey was quite daunting, as I had to secure both Indian and Pakistani visas.
Fortunately, Dr. Burke funded my journey, so that was a major load off my back. In fact, I would not have been able to attend the event if not for him.
If I got to Pakistan thanks to Dr. Burke, then I returned thanks to Glen, because he stepped in to solve a sudden emergency (flight problem) that I faced. If not for him, I'd probably still be stranded in Pakistan.

However, i'd say that the entire conference was an outstanding success, and totally worth the effort. I learnt many things on regional healthcare services / informatics. In fact, it was a real eye opener.
I also made very many friends from the Aga Khan University (Karachi) during my stay.

How did I present two papers in just under a week ?

I guess that many people are wondering how I did this, so here goes,

Firsly, I identified the need to publish papers following conversations with my good friends / advisors / mentors Glen, Dr. Burke and Joaquin of HST.
Professor Szolovits also recommended that I do so, as many people tend to do a lot of hard work, but fail to publish on anything that result from their efforts.
I always like to set targets to what I do, and in the case of research papers, Joaquin  (or more correctly, Dr. Joaquin) was my target. If you look at his CV (see here) you'll see that he has published an incredible number of top quality papers.

So one day I saw a mail on the OpenMRS mailing list calling for sumbissions for the eHealth conference 2012 (Pakistan) and so I jusmped at the chance to have a go.
I co authored a paper with Dr. Burke on FOSS solutions for healthcare. The paper studies why FOSS healthcare solutions can fail, and proposes a series of guidelines for implementors who are planning to take up FOSS helthcare. It was a very detailed research paper, and took up a lot of time, effort and dedication.


However, even as I was working on this paper I had the worry, 'ok, lets say that this paper is acepted. Even so, how can I actually make it to Pakistan to present it ? I don't have any money'.
I contacted my personal think tank, ex- Oracle manager and vissionary Glen McCallum. His advice was, 'think of that later, funding opportunities may be available. Focus on the paper for now.'

Naturally, I took his advice.

However, one week later I saw on a notice board that Sri lanka is going to have our own tech conference soon, and that there has been a call for papers. Of course I'll definitely be able to attend a local conference, so I quickly decided to work on another paper as well.
Of course, it was not quite that easy. I had to come up with a good topic.
Well, as luck would have it I realized that there was some quality research I had done a few months back, which was extremely suitable for publication due to its novelity as well as its relevance to a Sri lankan context.
So I wrote the paper, and submitted it as well.  Dr. Kulari Lokuge,one of my old teachers (currently with Swinburnne University, Aussie) was my co-author.
It was very hard work, writing two papers with such short notice, and I had to really push myself, but I finally managed to get it done.

But enough for this post. The rest of the selection process and other news will go into another post....

I just presented my second paper !

Updating my blog after a long time.

Looking at the title of my post, you'll guess that something major has been happening over the past month. Well, you're right. Not only did I present my first research paper, but went ahead and presented my second as well.
In fact, I only just returned home from presenting my second paper.
My second paper was presented at the NCTM 2012 conference Sri Lanka.

The conference website is : http://www.nctmsl.com/

My research paper was on EMR systems and rehabilitation treatment. It was a very pertinent paper from the Sri Lankan perspective, especilly as we are only just recovering from a war, and there are many disabled people in need of rehabilitation and therapy.
I feel that my paper was well received. It was also a major achievement for me.

So now you will ask, "wait, what about the first paper?"

Well that, my friend, belongs to another post. Also, I plan to post a more detailed description on my second paper as well. But I'm too tired to write any more now. Incredible as it may seem, I've been sleeping somewhere around just four hours a day for the past week or so !!

Nothing good comes easy :-)