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LARKANA: The Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Medical University (SMBBMU) hosted its first international nursing research conference at Chandka Medical College on Monday, bringing together national and international experts for the landmark event.
The two-day conference is held under the banner ‘VITALS 2026’, an acronym standing for Vision, Integrity, Training, Advocacy, Leadership and Service.
The opening ceremony featured a tribute to Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, as attendees raised mobile phone lights in her honour. A documentary was also screened, and Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Nusrat Shah joined guests in cutting a cake to mark Nightingale’s birth anniversary.
More than 50 research papers were presented by experts and students on the first day of the conference. Speakers lauded the SMBBMU for organising the region’s inaugural nursing conference, calling it a commendable initiative.
Speaking as the patron-in-chief of the conference, SMBBMU Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Nusrat Shah warned that Pakistan’s rapidly growing population had become a “population bomb”. She pointed out that only five to six nurses were available per 10,000 people in the country, whereas the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends one nurse for every five patients.
To address the shortage, she announced that evening nursing programmes had been launched in Sukkur and Larkana. Dr Shah stressed that hospitals required more nurses than doctors, and welcomed the participation of national and international experts.
The guest of honour, Dr Pamela Marshall, dean of Ziauddin University’s nursing faculty, said the event aimed to facilitate an exchange of ideas on modern trends and challenges in nursing education, research and healthcare services. She noted that Pakistan’s nurse-to-population ratio was critically low by global standards, making it essential to focus on the training and research capabilities of nursing professionals. Underlining the need to produce more qualified nurses with PhD and MPhil degrees, she added that critical thinking was essential to outperform artificial intelligence (AI). Over-reliance on AI, she warned, would drastically impair creativity and emergency-response skills.
Other speakers included Tazeen Saeed Ali from the Aga Khan University, Prof Dr Rashida Ali from Peshawar, Dean of Medicine and Allied Sciences and conference chairperson Prof Altaf Hussain Shaikh, Dean of Surgery and Allied Sciences Prof Shahida Shaikh and Registrar Fahad Jabran Siyal.
They maintained that thinking outside the box was key to achieving ambitious targets and developing innovative ideas to handle cases in a modern, AI-driven healthcare landscape. The speakers emphasised that nurses were akin to frontline soldiers, describing the decision to host an international research conference during Florence Nightingale’s birth month as a highly commendable gesture.
Conference secretary and principal of the Benazir College of Nursing, Prof Nazeer Ahmed Buriro, revealed that a total of 140 research papers had been received from across Pakistan, and eight pre-conference workshops were held in various cities of Sindh.
The research papers were presented simultaneously across six halls. He also expressed his gratitude to the experts who had travelled from Thailand, China, Kuwait, the Philippines and across Pakistan to participate. The event was widely attended by faculty members, officials, university students and representatives from both public and private nursing schools and colleges.
Published in Dawn, May 19th, 2026
