NIH Finds Home in MEDICAL OBSERVER
Two leading health organizations strike partnership for dissemination of research and policy initiatives
Beginning July, medical doctors, allied health professionals, and students of science shall have access to the numerous studies undertaken by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the country's leading research institution, through MEDICAL OBSERVER, the country's leading medical publication.
A special section called "The NIH Forum" shall appear in the print and web editions of the monthly publication to highlight completed and ongoing health and medical research projects of the University of the Philippines-Manila-affiliated institution.
Outside of academic publications and peer-reviewed journals, these studies will first see print in MEDICAL OBSERVER, and then disseminated to the national media. This way, a larger audience will have access to their results, which are often of public-health significance.
Also, the results of certain NIH studies in need of immediate public attention shall be posted in real time on the MEDICAL OBSERVER web site (www.medobserver.com).
Aside from research, "The NIH Forum" will contain health policies developed by the institution as well as opinion pieces coming from the NIH's pool of doctors, academics, inventors, and other researchers.
The partnership between the NIH and MEDICAL OBSERVER was made formal in June with the signing of a memorandum of agreement. Signatories to the MOA were Dr. Marita Reyes, UP-Manila chancellor and Conrado Generoso, MEDICAL OBSERVER editor in chief. Also present at the signing were Dr. Jaime Galvez-Tan, UP-Manila vice chancellor for research and NIH executive director, and Jena Fetalino, MEDICAL OBSERVER publication manager.
The NIH, established in 1996, initially operated as a research arm of the University of the Philippines system. It became the national health-research center in 1998 through Republic Act 8503 or the Health Research Development Act. It has eight research units: the Institutes of Ophthalmology, Biotechnology and Molecular Biology, Clinical Epidemiology, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Human Genetics, Child Health and Human Development, Health Policy and Development Studies, the Ear, and the National Telehealth Center. The NIH also hosts multidisciplinary study groups.
Meanwhile, MEDICAL OBSERVER is the country's first locally owned and operated magazine for doctors and allied health professionals. Established in 1992, it is the first and only Philippine magazine to be cited by the Society of Publishers in Asia for editorial excellence.
INCONTINENT NO MORE
To some people, it is an annoyance. To others, it is a source of embarrassment. But to urologist Marie Carmela Lapitan, it is a crusade.
"It" is urinary incontinence. For many years people suffering from it suffered in silence. Nobody talked about it openly, making people believe that it was nothing to worry about, that it was hardly a legitimate concern. If it were discussed at all, it was seen as a laughing matter. And so patients kept quiet, crossed their legs, and hoped nobody would notice.
Quite a number of medical professionals didn't regard it as a genuine problem. They saw it in some of their patients, true, but in most instances, they didn't actively pursue its treatment.
And so is urinary incontinence really worth worrying about? Lapitan, of course, says yes, and she has the data to prove it. "It is not as rare as we thought it was," says she, a researcher for the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
In 1998, while undergoing fellowship training at Singapore's Changi General Hospital, Lapitan became a part of a multicountry epidemiological survey on the prevalence of urinary incontinence among Asian men and women. She later became one of the project's lead researchers. Involving 10,000 subjects from 11 countries in Asia, the study was partly supported by the Continence Society of Singapore. The Philippine part of the study involved 1,000 patients, of whom 800 were female and 200 male. The results of the study were published in 2001 at the International Urogynecology Journal, in 2003 in Urology and the Philippine Journal of Urology, and in March in BJU International.
The study showed that 96 of the 800 Pinay respondents---12 percent, regardless of age---had a history of urinary incontinence. Meanwhile, 16 out of the 200 men had a history of the condition. If the study population were to be taken as representative of the national population, the number of sufferers would be considerable.
And yet, for every five incontinent Filipinos, only two could summon up the will to seek the attention of a health professional. Those who prefer not to see a doctor believed that it's only normal.
Which is the belief that Lapitan herself would like to see changed, not only in patients but also in doctors. Her desire to make people aware of the truth about urinary incontinence---something she calls her "pet project"---she continues to write and talk about it. She also conducts further studies about it, one of which is ongoing and supported by the NIH, about the best surgical treatment for the condition.
Lapitan Named One of Ten Young Scientists
A urologist, an educator, and above all a researcher---Dr. Marie Carmela Lapitan of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), was honored in July by the National Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) as one of the outstanding young scientists of the year. In a special ceremony held during the annual NAST convention, Lapitan was cited for the volume and quality of her research output in the field of medicine, particularly in urologic surgery. Her studies have seen print in both local and international publications and presented in medical conferences both here and abroad.
A researcher for the NIH since 2000 and an editorial member of the Cochrane Collaboration's Incontinence Group, Lapitan is a graduate of the University of the Philippines College of Medicine. She finished her residency training in general and urologic surgery at the University of the Philippines-Philippine General Hospital and her fellowship in urology at the Changi General Hospital in Singapore.
A fellow of the Philippine College of Surgeons and the Philippine Urological Association, Lapitan is also an active member of the Continence Foundation of the Philippines, the Asian Society for Female Urology, the Asia-Pacific Continence Advisory Board, and the International Continence Society's Continence Promotion Committee. In 2003 she was awarded an international guest scholarship from the American College of Surgeons.
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