Health-a-thon: Lifestyle on the GO 20/1/08

On 20 January 2008, 2 giant capsules called Mr. Capsule and Miss Capsule, “hamsters”, mimes, “blind mice” and worms invaded the Summit Subang USJ and Subang Parade much to the delight of those present as evident from laughter and cheers. For what occasion were they there? Ladies and gentlemen, let’s hear it for the Malaysian Pharmaceutical Society-Young Pharmacists Chapter HEALTH-A-THON: Lifestyle on the Go, which was held last Sunday.

After months of preparation and publicity, we saw 44 pharmacists, 20 students, 16 engineers, five representatives from MAICSA, four lecturers, one lawyer, one teacher, and one chemist, bringing to a grand total of 92 participants, answering our call and challenge to an amazing race. Divided into 24 teams, they raced through HEALTH-A-THON, fighting against time and conquering 12 stations in 2 shopping malls no less. The team who completed all the tasks at each station along the race in the shortest possible time and answered correctly the most Bonus Time questions won.

The HEALTH-A-THON event started at 10am with an opening speech by the Chairman of the organizing committee, Ong Aik Liang. He spoke about the establishment of the Young Pharmacists Chapter in September 2007 and HEALTH-A-THON being its maiden project. He also thanked his committee for their teamwork, the kind sponsors for making this event possible and the third year UiTM pharmacy students for their involvement and tremendous help.

The race then began at 10.30am with the participants having to complete a puzzle that would have thrilled Da Vinci Code and National Treasure buffs. After that, what did the participants face and have to overcome in their quest to emerge victorious?

Among others:
Figuring out what the essential items in a first aid kit were after assuming all this while that they knew. Reaching into a container filled with cute, shiny worms to draw out empty shells of capsules to produce 20 capsules filled with lactose. Donning mascots’ costumes to become either Mr. Capsule or Miss Capsule and distributing 10 pamphlets to the public. Playing Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Donkey game but instead of a donkey, a blank cardboard was put up and cards containing various label details substituted the tail. Having a go at the twister mat by balancing oneself with arms and legs all over or outside the mat for one whole minute.

Besides that:
Moving containers of cleaning liquids with different colours and smells to match pictures of various cleaning activities on a cardboard. Using a pair of chopsticks to pick up tablets and pills from an assortment of tablets, pills, capsules, beans of various colours and peas. Picking ping-pong balls with the correct registration number for products as instructed from a container filled with many misleading ones blindfolded. Braving through a bone density test and having to eat bread filled with wasabi as punishment if found to have less than ideal results. Miming tips on how to overcome addiction to smoking. At Caring Pharmacy, the participants were exposed to the concept of 5Rs (right person, right drug, right dose, right time and right route) by play-acting as a pharmacist and patient who needed an over-the-counter product to solve the medical problem posed. At Celebrity Fitness, we were treated to a fine display of human “hamsters” on treadmills as the participants took part in the “Hamster Wheel” game.

There was a deluge of information for both the participants and the public as the stations carried various health themes of interest such as rational use of drugs, hand hygiene, stress management, exercise, heart, bones, smoking cessation, consumerism and enforcement. The majority of stations were managed by the third year pharmacy students of UiTM while Bio-Life Marketing Sdn. Bhd., Y.S.P. SAH, NaturCare Organic Lacto-Fibre, FOMCA and Tupperware manned the rest. Lots of pamphlets, bookmarks and freebies were given away. At the Smoking Cessation station, there was an attention-grabbing giant cigarette intended to lure the public to a quiz to identify their addiction level.

The race came to an end at 3pm. Announcement of results and presentation of goody bags to all participants and prizes to the top five teams were at 4pm. The Vice President of the Malaysian Pharmaceutical Society, Professor Dr. P.T. Thomas, graced our event with a closing speech, in which he praised the organizing committee, the students and the participants for their commendable effort and he expressed his hope that there will be more of such activities to come, before giving away the goody bags and prizes.

HEALTH-A-THON: Lifestyle on the Go was closed with the Olympic Creed, which will serve just as well as a closing for this article and it reads, The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.

By Phuar Hsiao Ling

Links for photos:-
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=16813&l=0d577&id=751803110
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=16712&l=4b799&id=751803110
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=24955&id=547244044

The Malaysian Pharmaceutical Society - Young Pharmacists Chapter

Happy New Year, everybody! We hope that the New Year finds you in the best of health, wealth and everything else important to you. And we also hope that you are looking forward to the third Sunday of this month as much as we are! Yup, Health-A-Thon will go live in action in less than 3 weeks and you can be sure that we are working as hard as ever to make sure that all of you will have a great time then.

For the uninitiated, here’s a recap on what you have been missing thus far. The Young Pharmacists Chapter was established in September last year and Health-A-Thon is our very first project. This project will serve as an introduction for us and also as a community service event in which all of us can do our part and contribute to the society. Talk about doing some good this New Year and this can be a great start to getting your resolutions from words on mere paper into real-life action!

Health-A-Thon is a race that has participating teams completing a designated task at each station of the race. A number of interesting stations has been planned along the route of the race with health themes such as the heart, the bones, healthy lifestyle, rational use of medicine, consumerism and enforcement.

What can you expect from Health-A-Thon? A chance to make friends with young pharmacists, other young professionals and students. A chance to mingle with the public as part of your tasks is to educate the public. A chance to have fun, fun, FUN!

Still hesitating? Let us take a sneak peek at the prizes in store. Thanks to Celebrity Fitness, 200 of the 14-day passes and 6 of the 3-month memberships are up for grabs. If one of your New Year’s resolutions is to start being active and exercising, then this will be a fabulous way to begin and get motivated! Not only that, there will be lovely freebies and door gifts waiting for you.

The main venue for our event is in Summit USJ and this is where you will register at 9 in the morning. The other venue involved in the race is Subang Parade. After an opening and briefing session, we will be waving the green flags as participants begin their race all morning and afternoon with a short break in between. We hope to wrap everything up nicely at about 4 in the afternoon with the announcement of results and prize giving, leaving you to feel rejuvenated for work the next day.

So, don’t go on missing things any longer! For more information or to register, please contact either MPS at mspharm@po.jaring.my or 013-364 0089 (Mr. Lam) or 03-7710 3217 (Ms. Sharizawaty) or jennifertanseehui@gmail.com
(Ms. Jennifer Tan).

We’ll see you there!

By Phuar Hsiao Ling.

The Formation of the Young Professionals Alliance

KUALA LUMPUR: A Young Professional Evening was jointly organised by the Young Lawyers Committee and the Pupils Welfare Committee of KL Bar. Held at the Si Khiong Star Mercedes Benz showroom at Jalan Sultan Ismail here on November 17, over 180 people were present that night. The evening saw the launch of the Young Professionals Alliance by our Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports, Datuk Liow Tiong Lai. The Young Professionals Alliance is a body consisting of young professionals from the different professional institutions in Malaysia. The main aims of the Alliance would be the strengthening of ties among professionals, the sharing knowledge among its members, as well as pooling resources in order to serve the community at large.
Si Khiong Star offered an extremely elegant and classy ambience which created and enhanced the professional atmosphere. The setting was sophisticated yet simple, and this provided the perfect blend of mood which made for easy banter and interaction. The participants were particularly mobile concomitant of the fact that chairs were purposely made scarce in the main hall.The participants started to arrive by 5.00pm precipitating the committee members to flurry about to execute their designated tasks for a successful evening. Door gifts, compliments of Si Khiong Star were handed out to all guests.Ice lemon tea was served, and guests were invited to view the magnificent new C-Class Mercedes Benz, that was just recently launched. The guests were clearly fascinated by the line of Mercedes Benzes that were displayed in and around the building. The evening was actually a gathering of many professional bodies. In particular, the professionals were mostly Engineers, Pharmacists, and members of MAICSA. Not to forget, a large number of members of the Legal Profession were present too. There were also professionals from other bodies who came to support this event, namely Psychologists, Surveyors, and Chemists; amongst others. Among the Youth leaders of the respective bodies which officially supported the event were, Jennifer Tan who represented the Malaysian Pharmaceutical Society of Malaysia, Abriami Pasupathy who represented the Malaysian Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators and Yau Chau Fong appearing on behalf of the Institute of Engineers Malaysia. The Young Lawyers were led by Edmund Bon and Dipendra.The guests of honour were, Datuk Liow Tiong Lai, Deputy Minister of Youth & Sports and ADUN Kluang, Johor, Gan Teng Siew who arrived at 5.50pm, where the VIPs were seen mingling and talking to the many guests. As mentioned above, the primary purpose of the event was to launch the ‘Young Professional Alliance’ (YPA). The Alliance was actually nothing more than a label and title to what was already an ongoing relation between the 4 mentioned bodies. In the last year or so, these 4 Youth Organisations had many joint events in the name of charity and professional development. The YPA seems a logical and natural progression to give credence to these on-going activities. In an enlightening speech, the Deputy Minister applauded the efforts of the Professional Bodies for organising such an event and stated enthusiastically that it was indeed an ideal platform for young professionals to share their experiences and it’s a good opportunity for networking. He was also amazed at the large turnout for there were over 180 participants from various fields of professions. He was delighted and pleased to mention that the YPA were prepared to work with the Ministry of Youth and Sports for the betterment of the society at large.He then spoke about his Ministry and what it offered to the public. He placed special emphasis on the entrepreneurship courses and skills training provided for our youth. He felt that these facilities were crucial for the success of youth whom did not fully complete their formal education. His announcement of the Ninth Malaysia Plan allocating RM5.3 billion for youth and development purposes was met with a loud and enthusiastic applause. He concluded with the hope that more similar events would be held regularly.In his speech, Dipendra who represented the organisers and the Alliance, thanked the VIP’s for their attendance and the Deputy Minister for his support of the event. He then addressed the participants on issues faced by the Young Professional Alliance. He began by quoting John F Kennedy who famously quipped “ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”. His speech touched on creating an ideal balance of being successful in one’s respective profession and at the same push for the creation of a Just and Civil Society. In order to ensure Malaysia remained competitive in this ever increasing globalised world; is not only the responsibility of any individual stakeholder but requires, the coming together of all professional organisations committed to the same ideals. The objective of the Young Professionals Alliance was also outlined by Dipendra. He spoke of the Alliance’s commitment to the following ideals:
(a) Joint continued professional development
(b) Joint community projects
(c) Networking At the conclusion of Dipendra’s speech, he then invited the Deputy Minister and representatives of all the said Organisations to a simple cake cutting ceremony as a symbolic gesture to launch the Alliance.Dinner was served and the excellent cuisine provided by Banana Cafe was readily received. A lucky draw was also held, where 3 gifts were given away. The gifts were compliments from Si Khiong Star. By 9pm, the event came to a conclusion and once again, another successful project was carried out by the Bar.