HE Dr. Bandar Al Knawy, the Chief Executive Officer of National Guard Health Affairs and the President of King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences (KSAU-HS) launched the National Guard Resuscitation International Conference On Saturday, May 11th, 2013 at the Intercontinental Hotel. The conference was attended by 300 participants from various disciplines and lasted for two days, and it was also attended by an elite of distinguished Arab and international doctors, the European Resuscitation Council and other consultants from various disciplines.
The Saudi Commission for Health specialties, the Saudi Pediatric Association and Saudi Neonatal Society, Saudi Society of Emergency Medicine and the Saudi Society of Critical Care has also participated in this international conference.
The ceremony began with a reciting from the Holy Qura’an followed by a speech given by Dr Halim Kinsara, Cardiology Consultant, and the head of the Scientific Committee, He pointed out that this conference is one of the first conferences in the Kingdom in the field of cardiopulmonary resuscitation, several workshops has been conducted as well to raise awareness amongst the community.
Dr. Mansour al-Qurashi, Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Academic Affairs at KSAU-HS - Jeddah said that this conference aims to raise the level of health practitioners among doctors, nurses and technicians in dealing with critical situations that might lead to cardiopulmonary arrests to save lives and reduce complications that may occur as a result of such incidents, in addition to providing the participants with the latest information and evidence based medical practices in the field of CPR as well as promoting a culture of education and training in this field.
He pointed out that Training CPR Center of PTC has been accredited by the American Heart Association (AHA) as a training center in the field of cardiopulmonary resuscitation for Basic Life Support (BLS) and Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS), as well as Neonatal Resuscitation Program (NRP), which is the first center of CPR in the Kingdom that comply with the training standards of the American Heart Association Pediatric (AHP) and now it is the first Neonatal Resuscitation training center in the kingdom.
The Center has organized 166 courses in 2012 with the participation of 3026 trainees and 241 CME hours. In addition to the advanced trauma programs and surgery fundamentals, the center has been accredited by the American Academy of Disaster Medicine training program where 6 courses has been conducted during 2012 with the participation of 123 trainees, and it is the only training center of its kind in the Middle East.
After that, HE Dr. Bandar Al Knawy, the Chief Executive Officer of National Guard Health Affairs and the President of King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences (KSAU-HS) gave the ceremony opening speech and pointed out that the practice of cardiopulmonary resuscitation is one of the most important practices that the National Guard Health Affairs is keen on in creating the appropriate environment for such discipline to reach the highest levels in this field.
At the end of the ceremony, Dr.Al Knawy honored the speakers and the participating departments and he as well received a souvenir from the organizing committee in recognition of his sponsorship to this international conference.