Indian Cancer Congress Update - Friday

Today is the second day of the Indian Cancer Congress.  Met many gracious physicians and nurses yesterday.  I look forward to learning even more.  One of the sessions where I participated as a panelist was a Psycho Oncology session on "How to Give Bad News."  The discussion continued to help me to understand the importance and challenges of family members in relationship to cancer.  The senior male in the family is often the person who makes decisions.  That person may instruct the physician not to tell the patient about the cancer diagnosis.  One of the physicians said that he is very honest about the type and extent of the surgery with the patient but may not mention "cancer" as the reason for the surgery.

In another session, a physician discussed genetics and cancer.  She indicated that some families see cancer as a curse to their blood line.  My friend, Savitri, is doing research on the psychosocial aspects of cancer in the Asian population. Interesting information.

 I plan to incorporate information about what I learned into the legal and ethical issues course.

Greetings from New Delhi, India

Greetings from New Delhi, India.  I am here for the Indian Cancer Congress (ICC), which begins in the morning.  My nursing colleague, Savitri, and I have two appointment to meet with Indian nursing colleagues today.  We look forward to meeting others at the ICC pre-conference for nurses tomorrow. 

We are continuing to develop the Indian Cancer Portal at http://oercindia.merlot.org.  Your contribution and suggestions to improve the website are welcome. 

MERLOT OERC (Open Education Resources for Cancer) Portal in Development - OERC India

MERLOT is partnering with physicians and nurses in the country of India to develop a portal for cancer resources.  The website, still in development, is online at http://oercindia.merlot.org/index.html

I and several of my colleagues representing OERC will participate in the Indian Cancer Congress 2013 from November 20-24. As of today,  2700 attendees who have signed up for the Congress. On November 20, I will provide a pre-conference 90 minute hands-on workshop on the MERLOT OERC India portal.  I will also participate in two of the nursing oncology pre-conference sessions.

I look forward to meeting representatives from the Ministry of Health, nursing faculty, and students during the stay in New Delhi.  

There will be have a table at the conference to share information about MERLOT, OERC, and INCTR (International Network for Cancer Training and Research).

If any of the readers for this blog are interested in MERLOT or cancer and open education resources or OERC India, please:

• Join MERLOT
• Search for learning resources
• Contribute new learning resources
• Create Personal Collections
• Make comments about learning resources

MERLOT Open Education Resources for Cancer - OERC

MERLOT (Multimedia Educational Resources for Learning and Online Teaching) has a portal populated with open education resources specifically for cancer at http://oerc.merlot.org/.

Quoted from the website:

The OERC’s portal is open and free for everyone around the world to use to:

• Find free, open, and online educational and training resources.  We will be “recommending the best” and “linking to the rest” of materials that could meet your interdisciplinary needs.
• Contribute to the global digital library of cancer resources so everyone worldwide can have the best and latest information.
• Develop and lead the social networks needed to bring individuals out of isolation and into a supportive community.
• Participate in online community conversations with cancer researchers, physicians, healthcare professionals, and others working in cancer education to freely share experiences and expertise.

The portal is designed for all people interested in cancer types, treatment, care, and prevention.  MERLOT seeks new contributions and about the portal. Please feel free to email me with suggestions and comments.