MGR Medical University hosts women surgeons’ meet

The Tamil Nadu Dr. MGR Medical University, along with the Association of Surgeons of India, Chennai city, organised a national women surgeons’ conference to mark International Women’s Day, falling on March 8.

University Vice-Chancellor Sudha Seshayyan, who inaugurated the conference, said it was apt that the event was being aired from the university, of which the first Vice-Chancellor was a woman. “The life of a woman surgeon is not a bed of roses because much is expected of her professionally, socially, and on the domestic and official front, by her kith and kin and patients,” she said.

A woman surgeon was expected to meet these expectations, and she often exceeded them. The seminar was organised “to salute such women of grit and greatness”, she said.

The conference was in hybrid mode, with part of it held physically. The participants were eminent women surgeons teaching at medical institutions across the country. The topics included open and laparoscopic surgery, said M. Kanagavel, chairman of the Association of Surgeons, Chennai city.

The Association of Surgeons, which was established in 1938, has 27,500 members, including 2,900 women. The procedures discussed at the conference included laparoscopic gallbladder and hernia surgeries, surgery for cancer of breast and thyroid, surgery for piles and fistula and issues relating to surgery in women.