Kshama Bhatia
President RY 2018-19
 

Enjoy reading Midtowner !

Warm Regards,
Abdul G. Sait
Hon. Secretary R Y 2018-19

Dear Fellow Rotarians,

Every two minutes, somewhere in the world, a woman dies from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth. And babies whose mothers die within the first six weeks of their lives are far more likely to die themselves than babies whose mothers survive. As I’ve traveled around the world as president of Rotary, I’ve met families for whom these aren’t simply tragic statistics. But I’ve also met people who are devoting themselves to helping mothers and children — and because of them, I’m hopeful. And because many of those people are Rotarians, I’m also proud. April is Maternal and Child Health Month in Rotary, so it’s a perfect time to tell you about some things Rotarians are doing that will make you proud too.

Last fall, I paid a visit to a hospital in the town of Jekabpils, in Latvia. It’s a modern hospital, and the doctors and nurses there are caring, dedicated, and skilled. But despite all their hard work, the maternal mortality rate at the hospital had remained stubbornly high, due to a factor that was beyond their control: a lack of vital diagnostic equipment and even basic items like incubators.

And that’s where Rotary came in. Twenty-one clubs from around the world joined forces for a global grant that provided what the hospital required. And in September, when I walked into the maternity ward there, I saw state-of-the-art equipment, and I met patients who were getting the care that they needed — and that every mother and child in the world deserves to have.

In Brazil, club members worked with fellow Rotarians in Japan on a global grant project that dramatically increased the capacity of an overstretched neonatal intensive care unit. New incubators, monitors, and other equipment have enabled the local hospital to save many more babies’ lives each year.

And in Mongolia, a vocational training team from New Zealand organized instruction in emergency response techniques for doctors and midwives, set up a program that taught midwives modern best practices, and researched and wrote a culturally relevant childbirth education manual. Between 2013, when the team first went to Mongolia, and 2017, the neonatal mortality rate in the country fell from 11.2 to 9.1 per 1,000 births, and the maternal mortality rate has decreased as well.

That’s what I mean when I talk about transformational service, and it’s what Rotarians do best. Because of our networks, which span the globe; our community presence, which allows us to see what’s most needed; and our expertise, which encompasses countless skills and professions, we’re able to serve in a manner that has no equal. And we’re able to Be the Inspiration as we help those who need us most.

Barry Rassin
President 2018-19

Love everything to do with handcrafted textiles? Well, then, this was the exhibition, curated by textile and fashion designer, Mayank Mansingh Kaul, is what we need to check out! A weeklong exhibition that puts the spotlight on handwoven textiles, the event was included workshops, talks and movie screenings along with the display.

Midtowners walked through the exhibition and enjoyed the fellowship during Dinner.

At : Bangalore  International Center, Domlur 
Date: 4th April, Thursday 7pm – 8pm

On 20th Apr 2019, Saturday Free Breast Cancer Screening Camp was heald at Charitable Dispensary, Gottigere, Bangalore. Rotary Midtown with the support of Niramai & Team Allpink to help women using Niramai’s great technology.

Breast Cancer:
Breast Cancer is the leading type of cancer in women. According to WHO, one in every 8 women in US is at the risk of developing a breast abnormality in her life time. It is well-established that early diagnosis is very critical in saving a life of a cancer patient. NIRAMAI have developed a new cancer screening software that uses machine intelligence over thermography images to enable a low cost, easy to use, portable solution and requires minimal human supervision. This solution can detect cancer at a much earlier stage than traditional diagnostic methods and self-examination and can therefore improve survival rates. The method of breast cancer screening can detect tumors 5 times smaller than what clinical exam can detect, is non-contact, painless and free of any radiation, apart from being low-cost, and universally accessible. With this solution, women of all age groups can undergo frequent screening without any side-effects.

Niramai : A Novel Breast Cancer Screening Solution:

NIRAMAI solution uses a high resolution thermal sensing device and a cloud hosted analytics solution for analysing the thermal images. Their SaaS solution uses big data analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning for reliable, early and accurate breast cancer screening. The innovative methods used in  solution have led to multiple US patents. Their novel algorithms have also been peer-reviewed in international scientific conferences.

Their cancer screening tool, SMILE, has been tested on 300 patients data from 2 hospitals and one diagnostic center. Early results from these tests indicate very high accuracy that is comparable and sometime better that Mammography.

They have started 2 clinical trials with established hospitals to perform large scale, statistically significant clinical trials. They are working with multiple partners to make their solution commercially available.

Totally 17 women screened, due to unforeseen circumstances. The Bangalore heat rendered the Niramai process extremely slow and were not able to get down the temperature of the patients to the level required for screening to take place and the delay drove away a few patients and many patients simply did not turn up. 
 

On 30th Apr 2019, Tuesday Speaker meeting was held at 7.00Pm, at Oakwood, U B City, Bangalore. 

Prof.Elizabeth Cherian Paramesh is an Educationist, Public Health Expert and an Environmentalist and is currently the Administrator of Lakeside Center for Health Promotion. She is also the Managing Trustee of the Lakeside Education Trust which focuses on Continuing Medical Education Programs and research on children’s health and environment and geriatric care.

She has won several awards and honours, noted among them being the Karanataka Rajyotsava Award for constructive services to society in education and social service in the year 2000 and the Best Poet of the year Award by the Poets International in 2008, 2009 and 2010. She has also been awarded an Honorary Doctorate for her contributions to society.  She writes poetry in Kannada and English. She was recently recognised as the Times Power woman 2019 at Bangalore for excellence in social entrepreneurship.

Proud moment for two Midtown ladies!!  On  12th April 2019. 

Sangeeta Lala  was felicitated by Global Workplace Management Forum for Entrepreneurship and President Kshama Bhatia was awarded for Inspirational Leadership by Jain University.