This document discusses the differences between various types of academic events such as symposiums, workshops, seminars, conferences, and congresses. It notes that conferences typically focus on current trends in a field, involve abstract submissions that may undergo peer review, and include both oral and poster presentations. The document provides guidance on writing abstracts for conferences, including following a structured IMRAD format, keeping the abstract concise, and focusing on the study's purpose, methods, key results, and conclusions. It emphasizes including something novel in the abstract and cautioned against submitting already published, plagiarized, fabricated, or incomplete work.

1. Writing Abstracts for Conferences
Kishor Patwardhan
Professor, Department of Kriya Sharir, Faculty of Ayurveda, Institute of Medical
Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi

2. Symposium, Workshop, Seminar, Conference:
What is the difference?
Symposium
 Aimed at knowledge transfer
 Small event (Usually one day)
 Limited number of participants
 Invited lectures by Experts
 Scope for interaction: Limited
 No abstracts are invited

3. Workshop
 Aimed at skill-transfer
 Hands-on training is involved
 Limited participants
 Known experts / expert groups are invited to train the
participants in a pre-planned and structured way

4. Seminar
 Serves educational purposes
 Presented by budding researchers / students
 Exposes them to the process of delivering contents before an
audience
 Minimum number of presentations
 Limited audience
 Specific topics
 Scope is well-defined
 Example: Pre-PhD thesis submission seminar

5. Conference
– Large event, focuses on current trends in the field
– Pre-planned event
– Diverse topics with sub-themes
– Abstracts normally undergo peer-review
– Plenary lectures (addressing all participants)
– Keynote addresses (addressing individual scientific
sessions)
– Invites abstracts submissions
– Either Oral /Poster presentations

6. Congress / Colloquium
A huge event that includes almost everything:
Conference
Symposia
Workshops
Brainstorming
Roundtable Discussions

7. Purpose of a Conference
 Usually focuses on the current trends of education / research /
practices / policies in a field
 For a researcher, it is a ‘pre-publication’ event
 Opportunity to receive feedback on your work
 Opportunity to interact with different groups
 You can still improvise upon your work
 Poster Presentations: Provides better opportunity to have
feedback / interaction than Oral presentations

8. Submitting your work
to a conference

9. Kinds of submissions
 Original research
 Experimental studies (In vitro / in vivo studies, Educational experiments etc)
 Surveys / Observational studies
 Clinical trials
 Discussion / Policy /Theoretical papers
 Reviews /Hypothesis / Meta-analyses
 Case Reports

10. Pre-requisite
 You must have done some serious work before you submit an
abstract ! (Original Research)
 You must have given some thoughts on some debatable issues
(Policy / Discussion papers / Theoretical submissions)
 You must have developed some new insights after going through
the available literature on a topic (Review)
 Originality is the essence

11. Principles of writing an abstract
 Transparent, Ethical, Unbiased and Complete reporting of the
work
 Complete summary of your work / idea
 There must be something ‘New’ (Originality)

12. Parts of an Abstract
(Irrespective of whether it is structured or not)
 Title
 Authorship
 Introduction
 Methods
 Results
 Discussion and Conclusion

13. Title
 Title should be complete, specific and should cover the central idea
 Should include the key methods like ‘Survey’, or ‘Double blind
Randomized placebo-controlled Trial’, or ‘Observational study’ etc.
 Independent and dependent variables should be mentioned (e.g.,
Shvasakuthara Rasa and Tamaka Shvasa)
 Name of species (if not human) to be mentioned
 Do not use abbreviations, jargon, chemical formulas, series identifiers

14. Title conveys the ‘central idea’
 “Immunomodulatory, neuroprotective and longevity enhancing effect
of Emblica officinalis: an in-vivo study in albino rats” Is better than:
 “Evaluating the Rasayana effect of Amalaki”
 “How did Sushruta treat typhoid?” is better than:
 “The concept of Jvara in Sushruta Samhita”

15. Title for a work on clinical research
 Setting (location: North Indian states)
 Patients (what was studied: diabetic patients with chronic non-healing wounds)
 Intervention (treatment: Jatyadi taila)
 Comparator (control group: Standard of Care)
 Endpoint (outcome of interest: complete re-epithelialization without drainage or
need for dressings)
 Design (study design: Prospective, Randomized, Multicenter, Controlled trial)

16. Examples for complete titles
 A randomised clinical trial to evaluate the effects of Plantago ovata husk in
Parkinson patients: changes in levodopa pharmacokinetics and biochemical
parameters
 Six-month effects of integrative treatment, therapeutic acupuncture and
conventional treatment in alleviating psychological distress in primary care
patients - follow up from an open, pragmatic randomized controlled trial

17. Avoid:
 Institution’s name / number of cases in the title
 Outcomes of Panchakarma in rheumatoid arthritis: The Mumbai AyuCare
Ayurveda Hospital Experience
 Outcomes of Ksharabasti trial in Amavata: A review of 275 Cases with 5-Year
Follow up
 Interrogative titles
 Diagnosis of gastric ulcer by radiologists and endoscopists: Who is most accurate?
(Usually reserved for editorials/ discussion articles)

18. Avoid:
 Declarative Title:
 Grape seed extract prevents skeletal muscle wasting
(Results instead of writing what was studied)
 Instead, go for complete title:
 Effect of grape seed extract on skeletal muscle wasting in interleukin 10
knockout mice

19. Authorship
 First Author:
(Usually the corresponding author too)
 The one who has carried out the actual work /and the one who wrote the abstract/ and the one who will present it
during the conference
 [This is in contrast to a publication]
 Last (Senior) Author:
[Corresponding author for publication in a journal]
 The one who originally conceived the study, planned it and approved the final manuscript to be published
 Second/ third/.. authors:
 Who helped in carrying out the work and in manuscript preparation

20. Abstract:
 Reader should get the central idea of your work by reading the
abstract
 Should be brief
 Should state the problem and the hypothesis
 Should state the methods (e.g., Random Control Trial/
Observational study etc)
 Should summarize the results
 Should include inferences of the study
 Should not contain known/ generally accepted facts

21. Abstract
 Introduction/background: what was the purpose (10%)
 Material and methods: what was the study design,
techniques, and statistical methods (30-35%)
 Results: what are the most important findings (35-45%)
 Conclusions: why are the results important (20-25%)
Cornett, 2001

22. IMRAD
Introduction
Material & Methods
Results
And
Discussion
Ask a question
Attempt to answer the question
Obtain and compile data
Answer the question

23. Introduction
 What was known? (about the topic)
 What was unknown? (about the topic)
 Why did you do the study?
 What was the research question?
 What was the tested hypothesis?
23

24. Methods
 When, Where and How did you do the study?
 What materials / equipment did you use?
 Who was included in the study groups (patients, animals etc)?
 What statistical methods were used?

25. Results
 What answers did you get?
 Was the tested hypothesis true?

26. Discussion
 What does it mean in the context of the existing knowledge?
 Does it fit in with what other researchers have already
reported?
 What are the perspectives for future research?
 What were the limitations of your study?

27. Goal of an abstract:
“maximum info in minimum space”
Structured
 Uses headings to identify
 Follows IMRAD format
 250 -300 words
Unstructured
 Arranged in 1 paragraph
 Follows IMRAD format
 150 – 200 words

28. What makes a good abstract?
 Follows guidelines of the conference
 ‘Stands alone’ : it is an independent unit of information
 Is accurate (check for inconsistencies and omissions)
 Is readable and coherent
 Includes specific data
Cornett, 2001

29. Steps for writing your abstract
 Identify guidelines of the conference
 Highlight key features of your work
 Insert sentences into abstract format
 Write, revise, and condense
 Edit sentences and words
 Check final

30. Do you find this abstract alright?
Ayurveda is one of the most ancient healthcare systems in the world. The term
Ayurveda consists of two words: ‘Ayu’ and ‘Veda’. ‘Ayu’ means life and Veda
means knowledge. Therefore, Ayurveda means the science of life. In Ayurvedic
literature, immunity has been described as ‘Ojas’. This is of two kinds: ‘Para’ and
‘Apara’. In the recent years, immune system related disorders are being
increasingly recognized and the role of immunomodulatory drugs is being
explored. In Ayurveda, ‘Rasayana’ drugs are described to have immunomodulatory
effect. The present study aims at evaluating the role of Amalaki as an
immunomodulatory agent in animal model. Details are explained in the paper.

31. Do you find this abstract alright?
Ayurveda is one of the most ancient healthcare systems in the world. The term
Ayurveda consists of two words: ‘Ayu’ and ‘Veda’. ‘Ayu’ means life and Veda
means knowledge. Therefore, Ayurveda means the science of life. In Ayurvedic
literature, immunity has been described as ‘Ojas’. This is of two kinds: ‘Para’ and
‘Apara’. In the recent years, immune system related disorders are being
increasingly recognized and the role of immunomodulatory drugs is being
explored. In Ayurveda, ‘Rasayana’ drugs are described to have immunomodulatory
effect. The present study aims at evaluating the role of Amalaki as an
immunomodulatory agent in animal model. Details are explained in the paper.

32. Peer Review: abstracts
 Accepted only if they are exceptionally good
 Must provide new insights
 Rejected if repetitive and contain known information
 There has to be ‘something new’ and ‘interesting’

33. Do NOT submit:
 Already published work
(It is already there in the public domain)
 Plagiarized work / Cooked data / Falsified / Fabricated / incomplete data (It
will do more harm than help)
 The work that you have not done (Your senior’s thesis work !)

34. Advantages of conferences
 Abstract is often published
 Full paper may be published in proceedings
 You can present your work that is still underway and incomplete
 Based on the feedback, you can change the direction of your work
 Get to know people working in your field
 Can establish collaboration with other groups
 Most beneficial for young scholars / budding scientists

35. Limitations of conferences
 Mushrooming journals are serving the purpose of conferences !
 Your work will no more be a secret!
 Often Commercial interests dominate
 Often promoting self-interest
 Often promote only positive studies

36. Thanks!