Prof Chia Boon Lock receives the SMA Honorary ... - nuhcs

Singapore Cardiac Society lecturer award
Associate Professor
Tan Huay Cheem is
honoured as the
Singapore Cardiac
Society Lecturer for
Year 2008 at its
recently held Annual
Scientific Meeting
(ASM). This is an
award bestowed upon member who has contributed significantly
to the Society. A/Prof Tan has served in the Council of the Society
for the last 9 years since 1999, and was the Secretary, Vice
President and eventually President of the Society for two terms
from 2003–2005. He has contributed actively to many of the
Society’s continuing educational activities including helping to
organize the 13 th SCS Annual ASM in Year 2000 and many
international meetings such as the 13th ASEAN Congress of
Cardiology in Year 2000 and 14 th Asian-Pacific Society of
Cardiology in Year 2003. Cited by Dr Richard Ng, President of
the SCS, A/Prof Tan is described as a dynamic and winsome doctor
who is popular with both patients and colleagues locally and abroad
for his enthusiastic and invaluable collaboration and fellowship. In
his lecture, A/Prof Tan gave his insights on the “Management of
Coronary Artery Disease-Diagnostic and Therapeutic Advances” which
was warmly received by the audience.
FIRST PRIZE
Young Investigator’s Award
Dr Chan Wan Xian, Cardiac Dept @ NUH
It started with our department’s research grand round. After
presenting my project entitled “Cardiorespiratory Gas Exchange
Analysis During Dynamic Exercise Predicts Surgical Indications
for Severe Mitral Regurgitation”, fellow colleagues encouraged
the submission to the annual Singapore Cardiac Society meeting.
I started working with my mentor, Prof Ling LH, to beat the
dateline of submission. We went through our data and statistics
many times to draw accurate conclusions from months of hard
work of patient recruitment and data collection. We then
proceeded with the drafting of our abstract and finally submitting
just before the deadline.
After weeks of waiting, I received an e-mail from the
Singapore Cardiac Society notifying us that the abstract has been
selected for presentation at the Young Investigators’ Award session
at the annual Singapore Cardiac Society Meeting. I immediately
started preparing for the presentation.
Our post-graduate education director, Dr Poh KK, arranged
a practice session for us to present our studies to the department
before the actual presentation. I was not fluent in my presentation.
Fortunately, many colleagues from the department gave valuable
comments from presentation style to slides content. That provided
me feedback to reflect and improve.
After that were
sleepless nights to
modify my presentation
contents and to rehearse
my presentation style.
Seniors and secretaries
from the department
lent their help in all ways
they could. Special
acknowledgements to
Dr. James Yip, who lent me his books and articles on CPET and spent
time explaining to me the concepts of CPET; and my mentor, Prof Ling,
who patiently corrected my presentation and gave me invaluable advice.
The presentation itself was an experience which one could
not learn from books. It also provided me an opportunity to
learn from my competitors, research methods and presentation
skills. It widened my exposure to ongoing cardiovascular research
in other instituitions.
I feel most honoured to win the Young Investigator’s Award.
I will continue to put in my best efforts and hope to do well in the
coming Asean’s Young Investigators’ Award presentation in Hanoi.
THI PULSE | 12