HemmingsSTEFAN HEMMINGS, a 23-year-old final year medical student in the Faculty of Medical Sciences at the University of the West Indies, recently returned with accolades from an international medical students conference in Egypt.
In February 2003, the student attended the 11th Annual International Ain Shams Medical Students' Research Congress in Cairo, Egypt where he presented a research conducted by a group of medical students at the University of the West Indies (UWI, Mona), as part of their 4th year of studies in the Department of Community Health and Psychiatry.
The research paper entitled: "Knowledge, Attitudes and Sexual Practices of University of the West Indies Students Towards HIV/AIDS" was done by Hemmings SC, Bogle A, Bullock KR, Clarke N, Cox LA, Edwards GL, Morgan NR, Springer DCR, Stewart WH and Thompson INR. This list includes Stefan Hemmings himself and his medical, student colleagues.
The Research paper, presented in the form of a poster, won first place at the Egyptian congress, in the Best Research Poster category.
Hemmings told Outlook that, after days of being feted by their hosts (and visiting the pyramids), with other medical students, the award ceremony came at the end of everything and no one was more stunned than he when the poster picked up an award. Not that the subject was not interesting, but the competition was significant.
Only black participant
The Egyptian Conference hosted some 250 medical students from across Eastern Europe and Northern Africa. Stefan was the only representative from the Western Hemisphere and the only black participant (North Africans are fair skinned).
The poster has since travelled to Parnuu in the state of Estonia in March 2003 with the UWI Medical Students' Association (UWIMSA) representation, where it was presented at the 52nd March Meeting of the International Federation of Medical Students' Associations (IFMSA). It received excellent reviews and now some 10-15 countries are said to be considering conducting similar research at their universities, Hemmings told Outlook.
The IFMSA is a 52-year-old organisation representing more than one million medical students in over 70 countries worldwide.
The UWI research paper, completed in March 2002 by the medical student and a group of nine others as a part of the requirements of community health internship, was conducted among university population aged 18 to 51 204 students from all the faculties.
Some of the findings were that, while students were aware of the main means of transmission of HIV, only 50 per cent new that it could be transmitted by oral sex. There were also misconceptions. A few students reported that kissing could be a means of transmission as well as sharing of cups.
Seventy per cent of students were sexually active. Of that number 52 per cent did not use protection all the time. Forty per cent used condoms consistently.
"We found also," Stefan told Outlook, "that the older the students were the more they were likely to be sexually active. Students who were sexually active also perceived themselves to be more at risk for HIV than those who were not. But, a significant number thought that they were at low or no risk of contracting HIV even though they were not using condoms consistently.
"Younger students were less likely to consider HIV AIDS during sexual encounters. Older students think about it more."
Where the attitudes of students towards persons with AIDS was concerned, about 60 per cent of students thought that those with AIDS were unlucky, as opposed to being directly related to their sexual practices.
Thirty per cent thought that persons with AIDS were homosexual.
Among the recommendations made by the group of medical students were that more needs to be done to encourage behaviour change and awareness. More knowledge about conditions of transmission and more encouragement of safe sex practices among university students needs to be pursued, the recommendations stated.
Here in Jamaica, the poster which summarised the research findings was well received at faculty conference. Hemmings also presented the research group's work last November as a poster at the 11th Annual Faculty of Medical Sciences Research Conference at the University of the West Indies and was then awarded Best Research Poster. The poster went to Caribbean health research council meeting in Bahamas in May, was placed third.
Hemmings was more intent on adding to his experience and exposure when he lobbied family, friends and faculty to fund his 6,000-mile trip to Egypt.
Very surprising
"Winning the award was very surprising. There were 250 students from eastern Europe and Africa. In my category there were 40 presenters."
Hemmings, who plans to practise in Montego Bay after completion of his finals this year, hopes to continue research in that city (statistically with the highest levels of HIV-AIDS) with his colleagues.
The student's dream of medicine is no ordinary one. He said that, from he and his friends heard about Ben Carson (writer of Healing Hands) in fourth form, they all wanted to be like him.
Hemmings, also a former Head Boy of Kingston College, entered medical faculty after one year in Pure and Applied Science at the UWI and then moved on to medicine, where he made the Dean's list in the first year and was also awarded the Jamaica Government Exhibition Scholarship.
He and his classmates will do their clinicals and orals this month. He says, "God willing I will be working in Cornwall Regional in the summer."
Hemmings is grateful to Head of the Department of Community Health & Psychiatry, Professor Brendon Bain, Dean of the Faculty of Medical Sciences, Professor Owen Morgan, and the Student Academic Enrichment Fund administered through the Office of Student Financing, who assisted in getting him to Egypt.
O.T.
