All-Poland Scientific Conference of Student Scientific Circles of Psychiatry as well as Children and Youth Psychiatry “On the Other Side of the Mirror”

On Saturday, April 13, eCORRECTOR participated in the third edition of the All-Poland Scientific Conference of Student Scientific Circles of Psychiatry as well as Children and Youth Psychiatry ?On the Other Side of the Mirror? as one of the sponsors. The first edition took place in 2016 and we have been supporting the event since 2017. The main organisers are the Student Scientific Circle for Psychiatry active at the Department and Clinic of Psychiatry of the Medical University of Warsaw and the Student Scientific Circle for Children and Youth Psychiatry active at the Clinic of Developmental Psychiatry of the Medical University of Warsaw. This year, eCORRECTOR gave away notepads and pens to conference participants ? we hope they will prove useful during the lectures and workshops.

The organisers wish to create a space for cooperation and integration among future doctors of medicine who wish to specialise in psychiatry and psychologists. It is also a great opportunity for students and PhD candidates to expand their knowledge regarding psychiatry and child psychiatry as well as present the results of their research.

The third edition of the ?On the Other Side of the Mirror? conference was located in the Independent Public Children Clinic in Warsaw, with the lectures preceded by workshops.

eCORRECTOR?s Head of Proofreading, dr hab. Mark Hunt conducted a workshop entitled ?Essentials of Good Medical Writing for Research Papers?, and discussed the most important features of a good academic publication in medical sciences. The workshop was conducted in English and the participants were able to find answers to burning questions regarding academic writing.

Writing scientific papers is an inseparable element of a scientific career path; therefore, it may be assumed that it is among crucial skills of an academic. Sometimes research may take years as some endeavours are labour-intensive, costly and complex. All of that effort seems to be in vain if it is not crowned by a perfect publication on an international forum ? sharing the discoveries with the world and providing new reliable information is the mission of each researcher.  A good publication has to be a clear and comprehensible message so everyone reading it may replicate the methodology as well as understand the thesis, results and conclusions. The title and abstract have to be perfect, tables and figures legible and well though-out. The work has to point out what has already been discovered in the area and support those claims with relevant sources. The presented claims and conclusions should also be juxtaposed with the disclosed accomplishments of other scholars.

During the workshops included in the ?On the Other Side of the Mirror? conference schedule, dr hab. Mark Hunt talked about ways to write a good medical paper. Our Head of Proofreading provided some tips on working on individual sections of the publication, organising subsections as well as an informed and transparent discussion. He also pointed out the most common errors in preparing a publication, along with advice on how to avoid them. Additionally, workshop participants learned about common language errors in scientific publications of persons who are not native speakers of English. Some useful software tools that students may use while preparing their first academic papers were mentioned at the end.

We believe that the workshop was full of useful information that will surely upgrade the writing of all scientists present there, not only the youngest ones. We are delighted to have been invited and to have been able to attend the meeting.