The support group meeting of GIST patients was conducted as usual with
great excitement and joy at the Golden Jubilee Building, 2nd floor Lecture Theater, Rustom Choksi Auditorium, TATA Hospital, Parel on 8th November, 2014 from 10am to 1pm. The meeting was conducted by The Max Foundation on behalf of the Friends of Max. A total of 17 patients in and around Mumbai along with their caregivers and two doctors, Dr Abhishek Mitra and Dr Anant from TATA Medical centre were present in the meeting. One-to-one interaction session were conducted by the doctors and patients, where the problems regarding GIST and the side effects of medicines were discussed in details. All were very much benifitted with this Q & A session. Before the Q & A session, one small extempore drama of 15 – 20 minutes was ecacted and staged by the GIST patients as a therapeutic measure and to have awareness regarding the use of Tobacco (Guthka) among the public. This was the Drama Therapy workshop cover by The Max Foundation. There, two school going children buy guthka from a pan shop unknowingly which turns into a police case and the shopkeeper was punished for that. The drama was very much enjoyable and had a very good positive inspiration among the audience.
The meeting was concluded by vote of thanks by Ms Priyanka and lecture by Mrs Viji Mam from the Max Foundation with a photo session of all the participants at around 1 pm.
By-
Pradeep Mukopadhya, FOM Mumbai