IMU Associate Dean Honoured and IMU Student Wins Best Poster at NSM Conference

3-4 June 2014 – IMU Associate Dean, School of Health Sciences, Prof Winnie Chee was elected as a NSM Fellow in the Nutrition Society of Malaysia (NSM) 29th Annual Scientific Conference 2014. Fellow members to NSM are awarded for outstanding professional and meritorious contributions to the field of nutritional sciences. This include research and publications, representation in nutrition working committees at national /international levels and contribution to the Nutrition Society of Malaysia. Previous recipients from IMU for the NSM Fellow Members include IMU’s Dean, School of Health Sciences, Prof Khor Geok Lin; IMU’s Head, Division of Nutrition and Dietetics, Prof Fatimah Arshad and A/Prof Dr Tony Ng. At the same event, Tan Jie Wei from Semester 6 of Nutrition & Dietetics programme (now known as the Dietetics with Nutrition programme) competed with over 100 other participants and walked away with the first prize for Best Undergraduate Poster, with a cash reward of RM200 and a certificate from NSM. Jie Wei’s poster presentation was entitled ‘Assessment of total body water, fat-free mass and fat mass using bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) among distance runners’. The poster summarised the research findings and reported on significant changes in body weight, total body water, fat-free mass and fat mass in a group of 50 distant runners after a bout of training. In addition, weight loss after training was also found to be associated with an increment in total body water and fat-free mass, but a decrease in fat mass.   Jie Wei was overwhelmed with his win and expressed honour to have made IMU and the Division of Nutrition & Dietetics proud. Research supervisor, Dr Tan Sue Yee also felt proud of her student’s achievement and expressed her heartfelt congratulations. A total of seven IMU students from the Nutrition & Dietetics programme attended the conference which was held at Renaissance Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. The theme for this year’s conference was ‘Improving Lives Through Public Health Nutrition’. Annually, this locally organised conference is attended by more than 300 delegates, consisting mainly of academia, undergraduate and postgraduate students, staff members from the Ministry of Health, as well as industry partners working in the field of nutrition and dietetics. At this conference, undergraduate students from various universities in Malaysia will participate in the poster presentation competition, where they will present a summary of their research in the area of nutrition science.