Round 1 -Meta-Analysis Internship

The First Systematic Review and Meta Analysis Internship (the round 1) was arranged as a collaboration agreement between the West Asia Organization and Cancer Prevention, The APOCP’s West Asia Chapter, and the Department of Health Administration, University of Sharjah, UAE. 

The Organized plan and achievements:

Introduction: The systematic review and met-analysis internship program APOCP for Spring 2021 is design to help the prospect interns to go through the all steps of choosing a proper topic, running a systematic review and meta-analysis and publishing the result. The program is divided into three main modules:  1) Introduction to the program and logistical arrangement, 2) Teaching and lecture-based modules, and 3) Practice and assistant-based module.  For each module a platform will be assigned and all the lectures will be through the designated platform. The modules are further described as follows:

Module 1) The aim in module is mainly orientation and discussion on the logistics and how to arrange the lectures and practicality of the internship’s workflow. In this part, all the lecturers and assistants and intern will participate in a 30 to 45 minutes of discussion.  This module is arranged as a round table and everybody will have a video on and can have her/his thoughts shared.  The first module is scheduled as follow:

Module 1:  Introduction to the program and logistical arrangement

Module 2) Teaching and lecture-based modules:  This module is the main part of the internship. In this module, two main subject of the internship (systematic review) and (meta -analysis) will be discussed. The aim of this module is to familiarize the interns to the basic concepts of systematic reviews, and pooling of data through meta-analysis. Areas to be considered will include the rationale for systematic reviews, the basic steps in undertaking a systematic review and principal and concepts behind meta-analysis.  Databases and tools used in the systematic review and meta-analysis will be introduced.  This module two will be divided into two lectures delivered in two separate weeks: 1) the systematic review lectures and 2) the meta-analysis lectures. The lectures are 45 minutes time based on the arrangement made on the first module. The following tables includes the syllabus and the lectures topics (The date and time will be decided on the part 1 of the program)

Module 2 – Lectures-1 Systematic Review (the week 1)

*Each lecture take 40 minutes plus 5 minutes of Q&A

Module 2- Lectures 2 – Meta Analysis (the week 2)

*Each lecture take 40 minutes plus 5 minutes of Q&A

Module 3) Practice and assistant-based module is, in fact, the main part of the course in which an experienced teaching assistant is assigned to intern to help him through the process of choosing a real-world topic, do the search, find the relevant literatures, apprise and analysis the literature, do the statistical analysis and ultimately preparing the final product “a manuscript ready for submission to a proper journal.

It is expected that the intern has chosen her/his topic by the end of the module 1 and 2 which may take up to one month.  The suggested topic will be evaluated for duplication of topic. As soon as the topic is decided on by the intern an assistant will be assigned to the intern to help her through the steps of search, apprise, and analysis

The Faculties:

Alireza Mosavi Jarrahi, MSPH, Ph.D.
Prof. of Epidemiology
Dept of Social Medicine, Medical School, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
Past President-elect, Asian Pacific Organization for Cancer Prevention,
Chief Executive Officer, West Asia Organization for Cancer Prevention- APOCP’s West Asia Chapter

Seyed Saeed Hashemi Nazari, MD, Ph.D.
Professor of Epidemiology
Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health and Safety
Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease Research Center, Imam Hossein Hospital
Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences

Prof. Amina Mohammed Al Marzouqi, Ph. D.
Prof. of Health Policy,
Vice Chancellor at University of Sharjah
College of Health Sciences, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE

Syed Aziz Rahman, Ph.D
Associate Professor of Health Managment
College of Health Sciences, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE
Clinical Assistant Professor, University of British Columbia, Canada

Nabeel Al-Yateem, RN, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Nursing
College of Health Sciences,
University of Sharjah,
Sharjah, UAE

Dr.Ahmed Hossain, MS, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Biostatistics and Epidemiology
College of Health Sciences,
University of Sharjah,
Sharjah, UAE

In the first round of the Internship, nine interns registered. A total of 14 manuscripts were developed. The following table summarizes the details of the projects, Interns, and the outcome of the internship.