Call for establishing medical center for allergy and immune system diseases at Sana’a University

Yemen Observer: http://www.yobserver.com

Call for establishing medical center for allergy and immune system diseases at Sana’a University

Posted in: Sports, Health & Lifestyle
Written By: Thuria Ghaleb
Article Date: May 10, 2008 - 1:49:22 AM
New research in allergology and immunology take huge area in conference’s discussions

Officials meet together to launch the conference’s works, hoping to reach effective recommendations.

Once again, Sana’a University has embraced a large medical conference for allergy and immune system diseases, which lasted from April 29 to May 1. More than 500 Yemeni doctors attended the Third Yemeni-Saudi Conference of Clinical Immunology and Allergology and benefited from about 57 researches, as well as discussions held by 30 scientists and academics from Saudi Arabia and other different Gulf countries during three days. The Yemen Observer was there to cover the activities during the conference, to discuss the importance of the conference in helping allergy and immunology to be established in Yemen and in fighting against such diseases, as well as to gather opinions of people who participated or attended the conference.

Opportunity for doctors
“This conference represents one effective mechanism, which gives the opportunity for people working in medical field to update their information and exchange experiences with doctors from other different countries,” said Abdul-Aziz Abdul-Ghani, Chairman of the Shura Council, in the opening ceremony of the conference. “Such goals should be given top priority by doctors as well as academic, research, and medical associations benefiting from the world developments in this important field.” Abdul-Ghani finally praised the conference for the important medical topics which would be raised through its days.

The recent scientific and technological developments in diagnosing and treating different inherited immunodeficiency diseases were chiefly discussed during the conference. The conference was held in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at Sana’a University, in coordination with the university medical center at the King Abdulaziz University, the National Saudi Center of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology, as well as the Saudi Society of Internal Medicine.

Another success
This successful conference is added to the other two medical conferences of the same kind that were held in Yemen in both 2005 and 2006. The first was held in the Faculty of Medicine at Sana’a University and included more than 50 academics and doctors from Yemen and Saudi Arabia. In the second conference, more than 150 participants, including doctors, researchers and medical specialists participated in the Second Yemeni-Saudi Conference of Clinical Immunology and Allergology, which was held in the Faculty of Medicine at Taiz University.

Head of the Preparatory Committee, Prof. Jamil al-Mughales.

Dr. Saleh Ba-Surah, Minster of Higher Education and Scientific Research, confirmed that the conference has become an important event and looked forward to seeing such distinguished medical conference in the upcoming years. “I also hoped this conference to reach many useful scientific results in the field of allergy and immune system diseases to be carried out in the different Yemeni hospitals and faculties of medicine and not to stay restricted to a group of specialized doctors,” he said.

Increasing challenges
The conference’s recommendations should be also really implemented to achieve a lot in such field, Dr. Ba-Surah said. Until now, there is not a center or even a department specializing in the immune system in all of Yemen. “The participants in this conference should share in the project of instituting a center for allergy and immune system diseases which was recommended to be established in Sana’a University in the previous conference.”

In Yemen, very limited attention is still paid for some critical sciences such as allergology and immunology. Therefore, health facilities in Yemen have faced an increasing challenge in dealing with allergy and immune system diseases which affect different age groups, according to Dr. Abdul-Karim Ras’e, Minister of Public Health and Population. “These diseases require such health facilities to be provided with improved techniques in diagnosis and treatment. The specialized national centers should be also required to monitoring and treating cases, to training the medical cadres and to exchanging experiences with others,” Dr. Ras’e said.

Supporters
The private sector has played a major role in supporting this conference to achieve success. “As usual, Hayel Sa’eed Group in Yemen and Saudi Arabia financially provided us with what we need to establish such medical conference. There are always such generous people who support the scientific research and medical academic work to serve the society in general,” said Prof. Jamil al-Mughales, Head of the Preparatory Committee for the conference.

Serious problems
The conference also discussed the latest scientific achievements in the diagnosis and treatment of immune deficiency diseases and their relationship to other various diseases which affect different organs in the human body such as liver, digestive system, kidneys, vessels and glands.

Head of the Scientific Committee, Prof. Harb al-Harfi.

During the conference’s days, some work papers discussed in detail some serious problems found in the Yemeni society, especially lupus that affects the immune system, leads many patients to death and requires early possibilities for diagnosing and treating.

“The conference aimed to give medical students and consultants in the different specializations the necessary medical knowledge and experiences in the field of allergology and immunology,” said Prof. al-Mughales who is also a consultant diagnostic immunologist and Head of Clinical Immunology Services at the King Abdulaziz University Hospital in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Future conferences
“We hope the future conference to expand including scientists and academics from other Arab countries in addition to Yemen and Gulf countries to be a real point of starting exchanging the medical scientific experiences between Arab countries in such important field,” said Prof. Harb al-Harfi, Head of the Scientific Committee for the conference, in the closing ceremony of the conference.

As any other conference, there should be gaps in its arrangements according to Prof. Al-Harfi, who is also the Head of the National Saudi Center for Allergy, Asthma and Immunology. “We hoped before to make this conference an ideal one, but we promise to benefit from the mistakes that happened in this conference to make every effort avoiding them in the future ones,” he said. “Insha’a Allah, we will do our best to make the future conference in allergy and immune system diseases, in its scientific content and arrangement, as the world ideal ones.”

Participants’ opinions
After the closing of the conference, the Gulf participants showed their willingness to share in any other future scientific medical conference held in Yemen. “The conference was excellent by any standard. I surprised to see the medical students’ strong desire to know more about allergology and immunology. The huge attendees also showed me to what extent the Yemeni doctors have a high scientific awareness to attend such conferences and get more,” said Dr. Mona al-Ahmed, who is a consultant clinical immunologist and the only female participant, coming from Kuwait University.

The participants also expressed their admiration for beautiful Yemen and showed their sincere thanks for the preparatory committee and Yemeni people for the good hospitality.

Benefits of the conference
Advanced medical students greatly benefited from attending the conference. “This conference was a very important one for us as students preparing for advanced levels in medicine. We are always in urgent need of such conferences to get more. I really benefited from the conference’s lectures, especially the one related to eyes,” said Shaima’ Ghanem, a medial student.

Huge audience enrich the discussion with their comments and debates.

“The conference has provided us with much valuable wonderful information. There were many things discussed in the conference which I heard for the first time. I really do not know much information related to allergology and immunology since my knowledge is still limited,” said Amat al-Salam al-Afif.

“This is the second time I attended such conference which opens for me a wide scope to seriously think of such important field to be my future specialization in medicine. I did not have a willing to deeply study allergology and immunology before this time, but the conference gave me a good chance to review my ideas connected to these sciences,” said Arwa al-Huraibi, another student.

Strengthening relationships
Dr. Khaled Tamem, Sana’a University Director, confirmed that the two authorities of the two neighboring countries of Yemen and Saudi Arabia will always try to keep their joint academic scientific relationships moving forward for a bright medical future in both of them. “This conference is a typical example of developing and expanding the Yemeni-Saudi relationships in various fields, especially the scientific ones and it also comes to strengthen the connection between our Yemeni universities and their counterparts in Saudi Arabia and Gulf countries,” he said.

Other activities
A number of scientific lectures and workshops were conducted, according to the conference’s program during three days. The Arab doctors also visited some Yemeni governmental hospitals such as al-Thawrah, al-Kuwait, and al-Jumhoury in Sana’a, to examine some difficult cases. “We examined many cases during the conference’s days, but most of them were suffering from lupus and allergy diseases,” said Prof. al-Mughales.

Recommendations
As a result of long hard discussions and works during three scientific medical days, the Third Yemeni-Saudi Conference of Clinical Immunology and Allergology finally reached the following recommendations:
- Keeping on holding such Yemeni-Saudi Conference of Clinical Immunology and Allergology in periodic intervals and establishing more and more scientific activities to discuss this kind of diseases.
- Instituting a scientific organization, involving Yemen and Gulf countries, to be specialized in the continued and improved medical training for diagnosing and treating the different allergy and immune system diseases.
- Specifying a rate of medical students of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at Sana’a University to be sent abroad, specializing in the field of allergy and immune system.
- Supporting Yemeni doctors who are interested in allergy and immune system diseases to participate in the regional and world symposiums, held for such diseases, such as the annual conferences of American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology (AAAAI), British Society of Immunology (BSI) and European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI).
- Forming an executive committee to start implementing the project of establishing a center for allergy and immune system diseases in the Faculty of Medicine at Sana’a university; providing the center with all the needed medical cadres to play their important roles in the scientific research and therapeutic diagnosis for such diseases.
- Founding a scientific unit in the faculty to focus attention on teaching the basic, diagnostic and clinical immunology and allergology.
- Preparing workshops in a constant and periodic manner for immunology and allergology.
- Exchanging the medical therapeutic consultations between the faculty in Sana’a University and different medical centers of allergy and immune system diseases in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries; making periodic field visits to different Yemeni university hospitals to examine some cases, aiming at diagnosing, treating and improving the students’ medical knowledge in such important sciences.
- Keeping on coordinating between doctors in Yemen and Gulf countries to exchange medical experiences and to work together efficiently, achieving many goals related to allergy and immune system diseases.