SETIA ALAM, Aug 25 (Bernama) -- The 13
th National Conference for Clinical Research (NCCR), was officiated earlier today by the Minister of Health, YB Dato’ Sri Dr Adham Baba at National Institutes of Health (NIH), Setia Alam. The three-day conference themed “Conference Of Very Important Disease (COVID-19)”, showcased meaningful research advancements in the fight against the global COVID-19 pandemic.
Organised by the Institute for Clinical Research (ICR) and supported by Clinical Research Malaysia (CRM) and Collaborative Research in Engineering, Science and Technology Centre (CREST), the NCCR conference brought together medical experts and researchers under one platform, in exploring disruptive technologies, interdisciplinary digital health research and coordinated efforts to advance research in fighting against the COVID-19 pandemic that has affected Malaysia and the world. The conference was conducted on a virtual format this year, and was joined by 17 renowned speakers from Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, South Korea and United Kingdom.
Among the conference’s highlights was the CRC Named Lecture titled ‘Battling Against COVID-19’ which was delivered by Tan Sri Dato’ Seri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah, Director General of Health. The 13
th NCCR conference also received a total of 194 scientific abstracts from clinical, biomedical, public health, digital health, health systems research and behavioral research areas for both e-Poster as well as for the Dr Wu-Lien Teh Research Awards categories.
YB Dato' Sri Dr Adham Baba also presented the Young Investigator Awards (YIA), a category under the Dr Wu-Lien Teh Research Awards, to recipients during the opening ceremony. Dr Git Kim Ann, a radiologist and imaging informatics professional from Hospital Selayang, was awarded the YIA winner for optimizing an Artificial Intelligence (AI) model in the detection of COVID-19 on chest radiographs. The multi-center study involving five study sites and seven investigators, would further complement the ability to detect COVID-19. Dr Wong Xin Ci (ICR) and Dr Kuan Pei Xuan (ICR) were subsequently awarded the first and second runner-up for their work on COVID-19 research as well. Dr Wong’s study in determining the risk factors associated with the disease severity could further help in risk stratification for COVID-19 patients and Dr Kuan’s health systems research provides a modelling in testing the bed capacity preparedness of Malaysian hospitals to overcome surge capacity. MOH researchers Mr Mohamad Hasnan Ahmad (Institute for Public Health), Ms Wan Shakira Rodzlan Hasani (Institute for Public Health), Ms Jeyanthi Suppiah (Institute for Medical Research) and Ms Chiew Shoen Chuen (Hospital Seri Manjung) were all awarded the YIA Merit awards respectively.
The Ministry of Health’s (MOH) robust efforts in handling the pandemic were also shared by both the Deputy Director Generals of Health in Medical Development and in Public Health during the conference. The findings from multi-disciplinary research and sharing of experience from infectious disease experts during the conference highlights the importance of clinical research and the need for more of it in this field for better clinical decision-making in Malaysia’s public health response. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) of MOH, consisting of six research institutes in which ICR is one, have been integral for having conducted more than 40 research projects related to COVID-19 and in establishing a patient registry with clinical information of all the COVID-19 patients admitted to hospitals. The Institute for Medical Research (IMR), which have developed and led the COVID-19 diagnostics testing in the country, are conducting progressive biomedical research into the virus ranging from genome sequencing and molecular epidemiology to vaccine research and studying anti COVID-19 properties in certain compounds. Among recent breakthroughs was the detection of the highly infectious D614G mutated strain after full genome sequencing of samples from the Sivagangga cluster. The National Health and Morbidity Survey 2020 (NHMS 2020) led by Institute for Public Health have also incorporated the COVID-19 seroprevalence survey in the community study, aimed to obtain the status of COVID-19 infection within the community in different age groups. This collaborative project with IMR is noted to be the first of such study in Southeast Asia. In addition, NIH have also organized a series of webinar which shares clinical updates in COVID-19 periodically to the medical and scientific community nationwide.
“Amidst these challenging times, it is encouraging to see the wider application of online platform, machine learning, big data, artificial intelligence (AI), genomics, robotics and 3D printing for effective healthcare service delivery. Whilst we are seeing tremendous opportunities in these areas, we still require on-going research to monitor outcomes especially centric to the patient.” said YB Dato’ Sri Dr Adham Baba during his opening address.
For more info, please visit
http://www.nccrconference.com.my SOURCE: Clinical Research Malaysia (CRM)FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:Name: Dr. Norizan Rosli Tel: +6019-398 5712 / +603-3362 8803Email: norizan@crc.gov.my--BERNAMA 
