Key features of the book:
This book has been specially prepared keeping in mind the needs of postgraduate students in Medicine. As the title implies, postgraduates are virtually held by hand and guided “step by step” through the dissertation process raising and answering the questions which usually arise in their minds sequentially.
The book is in four sections:
Section 1, deals with planning and starting the dissertation process with chapters such as selection of a topic, review and management of relevant literature, writing and finalizing the aims and objectives and the type of study, research ethics and relevant statistics etc.
Section 2, deals with the actual writing process of the various sections of a dissertation.
Section 3, deals with fulfilment of post submission regulatory norms such as preparing a poster or a podium presentation from the dissertation or converting the dissertation to a scientific paper.
Section 4, deals with useful technical adjuncts to the dissertation process such as recording and maintenance of data, layout and formatting and some statistical packages of use to the postgraduates with demonstration of their utility.
Though principally written for the students of modern medicine, it has also been found useful by postgraduate students of complementary systems of medicine faced with similar issues.
Preface of the book:
In the six years since the publication of the first edition of this book, the editor and the authors have received feedback both from faculty and postgraduate students with suggestions for incorporation in the book and for addition of a few topics which the postgraduates felt would be useful to them.
In view of these, the second edition has been prepared with every chapter being critically reviewed by the authors and by the editor with modifications and additions keeping in mind recent developments. Also, six new chapters have been added largely based on felt need and feedback. These are chapters on qualitative research, preparation of a questionnaire, an additional section to the chapter on statistics on Odds Ratio and Relative Risk which are used widely by postgraduates who find them confusing, conversion of a postgraduate dissertation to a conference podium presentation and a poster which now form part of regulatory requirements. A chapter is also included on useful statistical packages for dissertation preparation. Unfortunately, these have added a few pages to the book. It has been the endeavor of the editor to keep these additional pages to the minimum.
The second edition has been divided in to four sections as per the chronology of activities of the postgraduate residents, viz. planning and starting a dissertation, writing a dissertation, post submission requirements and useful adjuncts in dissertation preparation.
The new version is intended to serve as a one stop solution to the postgraduates for all their issues with Preparation of a Dissertation.
The Editor and the authors are gratified with the response to the first edition which was prepared entirely keeping in mind the needs of the Indian Postgraduate student faced with a new exercise. It is hoped that the second edition will also be found useful by them, by the junior faculty and by the guides.
