Aussie Freebie

Today I attended the first day of a 3-day annual event here in Melbourne. The Forbes Week is an annual event organized by the Melbourne Infectious Diseases Group (MIDG).

Every year for the past 20 years, the MIDG has invited a Forbes Fellow to spend the week in Melbourne, giving keynote lectures, ward rounds and teaching ID Fellows.

The Forbes Fellowship is named in honour of Dr. John Forbes, a leading Australian Infectious Diseases physician who inspired a whole generation of ID physicians in Australia. The key attributes of a Forbes Fellow are that they are an outstanding clinician, have a strong history of clinical research and are an excellent teacher.

The Forbes Fellow for 2011 is Joel Gallant, who is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Johns Hopkins and a Professor of Epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, USA.

It’s like being given the opportunity to seat at the footstool of great minds!

Today’s seminar was held at the Alfred Hospital, arguably THE HIV-treatment centre in Melbourne. The whole day was spent listening to experts talking about all things related to infectious diseases. After every 2 sessions, we break for food and beverages! (Which meant I did not have to cook! Heh heh!)

And what’s an ID meeting without some freebies? I got these today:

Notebooks, a stethoscope tag, 2 pens and the desire of my heart: The 2010 Edition of Therapeutic Guidelines! I was going to buy this book last week at the Melbourne University book shop but decided not to because it costs AUD 40! I am glad I didn’t! Phew!

I was told that the pens given to me are ‘special’ pens. Apparently they are antibacterial! “The plastic material used and even the ink is antibacterial!”, gushed the pharma rep!

I have my doubts about the pen being antibacterial, but hey, you can check out the website and judge for yourself!

Wed, 101110 @ 1954

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