Monash Malaysia
Medical Lecture Series
Are we medicalising normality in
women’s health?
Dr Martien Snellen, a perinatal psychiatrist from
Melbourne, was the guest speaker of the Medical
Lecture Series organised by the Jeffrey Cheah School of
Medicine and Health Sciences and the Monash
Education Academy. His talk explored the medicalisation
of normal female emotional, physiological and
behavioural reactions that occur during the lifecycle,
with particular reference to premenstrual syndrome,
menopause and female sexual functioning.
Did Leonardo Da Vinci inspire 20th
century Nobel prizes in medical radiology?
A lecture by Dr Peter Abrahams, Professor Emeritus of
Clinical Anatomy at Warwick Medical School, showed
how astute, accurate and significant Da Vinci’s anatomy
drawings are and how little the detailed knowledge of
human anatomy has changed in 500 years.
Celebrating culture
The One World Week, organised by our student country
representatives in collaboration with the Monash University
International Students Service, provided students with the
opportunity to enjoy the various arts and crafts, traditional
music, cultural dances, and taste of local foods of 10 different
countries and regions.
Harnessing artificial intelligence to
improve healthcare delivery
Automation is here to stay and help us redefine the meaning of
everything we do, including saving lives. IBM ASEAN’s strategic
client business development leader Jitinder Magoon structured
his talk around the company’s intelligent question-answering
computer system, Watson. The system has been used
extensively in the healthcare domain to create and advise
deliverables in personalised cancer treatment, drug discovery,
and individualised health planning. While machines may be
more precise, Magoon stressed that technology is here to assist
and expedite processes, not to override our decisions.
Going back to basics in cancer prevention
Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, Emeritus
Vice-Chancellor of University of Cambridge and former
chief executive of the UK Medical Research Council,
spoke on the topic of ‘Cancer and Life Sciences’.
Professor Borysiewicz emphasised basic prevention
strategies such as not smoking, maintaining a healthy
weight, minimising alcohol intake and consuming a
high-fibre diet. He also stated that affordable and
effective diagnostics technology will have a greater
impact on the public than expensive medical equipment.
17
Revolutions in neuroscience
The Monash–Newcastle Neuroscience Symposium on ageing,
organised in collaboration with Newcastle University, saw more than
130 participants gathering for talks on emerging approaches and
treatments by distinguished neuroscientists from Japan, Korea,
Australia and the United Kingdom. At the roundtable discussion,
invited speakers from Monash University Australia and
Newcastle University explored future collaboration initiatives.