Annual Public Health Ph.D. Workshop

Annual Public Health Ph.D. Workshop

Date

     20th & 21st -January-2022

Venue

Institute of Public Health, Bengaluru

 

Please fill this google form by 5th January 2022

About the workshop:
Ph.D. students in their journey are not only expected to equip themselves with the necessary skills and competency but also navigate through a demanding doctoral process. The lonely nature of the Ph.D. also prevents them from meeting their peers and interacting with them. Conferences, symposiums are such platforms where Ph.D. scholars get an opportunity to meet each other and build a network. However, considering the dominance of technical sessions within such platforms, it becomes difficult to engage and network with like-minded people closely. Thus, the aim of this workshop is to provide a platform that facilitates interaction among Ph.D. and aspiring Ph.D. students and stimulates learning from peers and experienced researchers.

This workshop is an amalgamation of technical sessions and informal conversations and would be conducted in a hybrid format with virtual and in-person sessions (if covid permits). The workshop will use interactive methods and activities to open up conservations among students not only related to the research process but also on their experience of traversing through the Ph.D. terrain. This is the first workshop of its kind at the Institute of Public Health, Bengaluru. We hope to organize this workshop on an annual basis.

What will the workshop offer to the participants?

1. Improve their scientific writing, and presentation skills and learn how to communicate their findings to a larger audience including fellow researchers, policymakers, and layperson
2. Build their reviewing skills and learn how to review a paper
3. Opportunity to network with their peers and boost their networking skills for conferences
4. Learn how to handle various challenges while traversing through the Ph.D. terrain
5. Gain an understanding of the scope and direction after Ph.D.

Who can apply?
The applicant must fulfill any of the below criteria to be eligible for applying for the workshop- Ph.D. student at the Institute of Public Health (IPH), Bengaluru
– Associated with IPH in any capacity and have an aspiration to pursue a Ph.D.
– Associated with any of the partner organizations of IPH and having an aspiration to pursue a Ph.D. or currently pursuing a Ph.D.

The total number of participants: We would like to restrict the number of participants to 20 only for a fruitful engagement. If there are more than 20 applications, we would select participants on a first come first serve basis. The preference will be given to currently pursuing Ph.D. students.

Fees details
The fee for the workshop is Rs.10,000/- (including GST) INR. The fee will cover accommodation (if needed), training costs, food, and workshop materials. A partial or full waiver will be awarded to deserving candidates. Kindly indicate if you need a scholarship in the application form and we will send you the scholarship form. Please note that we have a limited number of scholarships. Hence, we request you to apply if and only if it is necessary.

Session Covered

  • Introduction and Welcome
  • Pitch your Ph.D. in 2 minutes
  • Learning from an experience: An interaction with a Ph.D. holder
  • Skill-building session-1: Presentation, communication, and public speaking skills
  • Skill-building session-2: A debate on inclusive science
  • Skill-building session-3: Engaging meaningfully in a conference
  • Skill-building session-4: Art of writing a thesis
  • Skill-building session-5: Reviewing a paper
  • Mental health in Ph.D.
  • Post Ph.D. journey
IPH, Bengaluru staff participate in the 5th National Conference on Tobacco or Health

IPH, Bengaluru staff participate in the 5th National Conference on Tobacco or Health

Thirteen members of the Chronic Conditions and Public Policies cluster at IPH actively participated in the three day conference of the 5th National Conference on Tobacco or Health (NCTOH). This three-day scientific programme focused on diverse public health issues and challenges in tobacco control at the national and sub-national level along with context-specific solutions for their replication towards achieving tobacco free environments. There were plenary sessions, panel discussions, symposia, oral presentation, poster discussion, and workshops on many aspects of tobacco control which will pave the way towards building effective policy and program.

Dr Upendra Bhojani, Riddhi Dsouza, Anand Kumar, Kanika Chaudhary, Ketki Shah, Dr Pragati Hebbar, Vivek Dsouza, Dr Chandrashekar Kottagi, Kranthi Vysyaraju, Aishwarya Ashok, Praveen Rao, Achyutha Nagara Gadde and Kumaran P from the Institute of Public Health (IPH), Bengaluru actively participated in this 3-day national conference held between September 25 and 27, 2021.
Dr Upendra Bhojani, Director, IPH Bengaluru on Day 1 (September 25, 2021) was in a panel discussion and presented on “How should we approach commercial determinant of health?”, he was part of the plenary session on September 26, 2021 on “Emerging Issues in Tobacco Control: Contextualising Global Interventions” and he presented on “Tobacco Industry Interference”.

Dr Pragati Hebbar made two oral presentations- “Implementation’ of tobacco control policies in LMICs – a realist synthesis to explain the process and its facilitators and barriers” and the second, “LifeFirst: Impact of a school-based tobacco- and supari-cessation intervention among adolescents in Mumbai, India.”

This national conference was a boost to tobacco control efforts by the amalgamation of tobacco control professionals, health programme managers, public health experts, civil society advocates, academicians and researchers of various clinical and non-clinical disciplines from different states across the country under one roof who shared their contextual experiences and best practices in tobacco control which was aimed to ultimately lead to advancing tobacco control in the country.

To get a glimpse of the 5th NCTOH click: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Drv30sDRoTU

Preventing TII in Karnataka

Preventing TII in Karnataka

Consultancy project with the State Anti-Tobacco Cell

Symposium on Applied Research in Tobacco Control and Regional Stakeholder Meeting’ (Virtual) was held on 16th September 2021 in association with the Tobacco Control Capacity Programme and State Tobacco Control Cell, Government of Karnataka. Dr. Upendra Bhojani (Director, IPH-Bengaluru) was invited to talk about Tobacco Industry Interference (TII) prevention measures for Karnataka. The event was organised by Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE).

Paper on food laws to ban smokeless tobacco products in India

Paper on food laws to ban smokeless tobacco products in India

Consultancy project with the State Anti-Tobacco Cell

(BMJ) Tobacco Control recently published a paper by Dr. Upendra Bhojani and Riddhi Dsouza from the DEEP project at the Institute of Public Health, Bengaluru. The paper analysed how several states in India used food laws to ban certain smokeless tobacco products overcoming the intense legal resistance mounted by the tobacco industry. This was done by analysing all the tobacco-related litigations under food law in the High Courts and the Supreme Court of India. The full text of the paper titled “Strategic and contested use of food laws to ban smokeless tobacco products in India: a qualitative analysis of litigation” can be found here.

Anusthana’s protocol paper published in BMJ

Anusthana’s protocol paper published in BMJ

Dr. Pragati Hebbar together with Vivek Dsouza, Upendra Bhojani, Onno CP van Schayck, Dr. Giridhara Babu, and Gera Nagelhout co-authored a protocol paper titled “Implementation research for taking tobacco control policies to scale in India: a realist evaluation study protocol”.  This protocol is part of project ‘Anushthana’ and outlines the five-year study undertaken within the Chronic Conditions and Public Policies cluster at the Institute of Public Health (IPH). Tobacco use is responsible for 1.3 million deaths in India each year and is a major public health threat. Although comprehensive tobacco control measures like the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act (COTPA), 2003, and the National Tobacco Control Programme (NTCP) exist, implementation remains varied and suboptimal across Indian states. Through this study protocol, our attempt is to understand the implementation landscape in India with respect to tobacco control.

We do this by

  • Assessing the implementation process of current tobacco control policies.
  • Identifying the underlying conditions for variation during implementation
  • Identifying the factors that support or undermine implementation in settings where issues around tobacco are complex and multi-dimensional.

Anushthana is funded by the DBT/Wellcome Trust India Alliance. The protocol paper is published in BMJ Open and can be accessed here

Evaluation of a school-based tobacco/supari cessation program

Evaluation of a school-based tobacco/supari cessation program

Consultancy project with the State Anti-Tobacco Cell

Dr. Upendra Bhojani, co-authored a paper in Population Medicine journal, along with Dr. Pragati Hebbar and Amiti Varma from the Chronic Conditions and Public Policies cluster at IPH-Bengaluru. The paper evaluated a school-based tobacco/supari cessation intervention programme helping corporation school students in Mumbai. This quasi-experimental study was conducted using a difference-in-difference analysis approach. The full-text can be accessed here