Part 3
At this stage also I met Dr. Abdul Hadi Al Khalili in an interview for our journal. He was the Head of Neurosurgery Department and I had no idea how much he will influence me.
Dr. Al-khalili is one of the few people who gather so many talents and he had so many things to give.
He was an eminent neurosurgeon, with special interest in the orbit surgery. He wrote and translated many books and articles about neurology, neurosurgery and medical ethics. He was also a leading figure in research field.
He discussed with me his idea to establish a research group among the medical students. Basically, this group would be composed of students who are willing to do extra curricular activities in the field of research.
The project was finally developed and we had formed the Students Research Group, which Dr. Al Khalili supervised and appointed me the head of this Group.
The group was subdivided into four main divisions. These are, the Clinical Research, Basic Research, Statistical Research, and Laboratory Research.
Any interested student could approach the Group, choose his/her interest among the four main fields, and the Group duty was to ensure that the student is enrolled in a research exercise in that field.
We had about 60 students who were actively enrolled in various research projects.
We had also arranged many lectures and conferences to discuss the issues of research and its importance to medical students.
Unfortunately, we were always suffering from shortage of resources and the Dean was not very interested in our activities. Nevertheless, our main aims were met with success.
Through that Group, I met another eminent figure in the research field, Dr. Adnan Al-Araji (FRCP, UK).
Dr. Al-Araji was a true talent and visionary man in research field. With very limited resources, he established the Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Clinic in Medical City in Baghdad. MS was his main field of interest. The idea of the clinic was to provide the necessary treatment to the sufferers of this devastating disease.
The clinic was an invaluable resource to study the characteristic behaviour of that disease in Iraq.
Being of unknown aetiology, MS has fascinated the scientists' world wide to look for its cause. The clinic held one of the most accurate statistics about the disease behaviour and response to treatment in Iraq.
Under the supervision of Dr. Al-Araji, I wrote my first draft ever in a scientific method. It was a review article entitled (Multiple Sclerosis in Iraq). It summarised the main Iraqi studies about the disease, a very few actually.
My final year in the College was more stable than ever. I had much spare time to arrange for many activities.
I was looking forward to start my career as a doctor serving the sick, improving the health, and giving the best for his society.
Photo credit: Forum of the College of medicine, Baghdad University. www.thebcmf.com.