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Lung cancer is the most common leading cancer in both men and women all over the world. Accurate image segmentation is an essential image analysis tool that is responsible for partitioning an image into several sub-regions. Active contour model have been widely used for effective image segmentation methods as this model produce sub-regions with continuous boundaries. It is used in the applications such as image analysis, deep learning, computer vision and machine learning. Advanced level set method helps to implement active contours for image segmentation with good boundary detection accuracy. This paper proposes a model based on active contour using level set methods for segmentation of such lung CT images and focusing 3D lesion refinement. The features were determined by applying a multi-scale Gaussian filter. This proposed method is able to detect lung tumors in CT images with intensity, homogeneity and noise. The proposed method uses LIDC-IDRI dataset images to segment accurate 3D lesion of lung tumor CT images.

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AimsThriving on the pressure of “publish or perish” experienced by academicians, the industry of predatory publishers with dubious quality has mushroomed and gained their notoriety. The battle of uncovering predatory publishers, including Beall's list, has proven to be tough given the huge monetary gain generated by the predatory publishers. It may be difficult for an inexperienced junior researcher to identify those predatory publishers’ soliciting emails, which may disguise as a reputable journal's article-commissioning process. To date, there is a limited systematic approach to identify such emails. Hence, this research is aimed to describe the common features of soliciting emails from publishers which appeared to be predatory.MethodThis self-study involved reviewing the content of emails in the spam folder of authors, a team of junior researchers in psychiatry, for a month. Emails included in this study were soliciting emails relevant to publications and the following were reviewed: types of solicitation, sentences used, strategies used, and information available in the public domain of their webpages. Informative types of emails were excluded.ResultThe solicitation could include: 1) request for a manuscript to be published a journal article, 2) request for a thesis to be published as a book, 3) request to write for a book chapter, 4) invitation to be an editorial member or a reviewer with the offer of free publishing, 5) invitation to be a speaker for a conference, and 6) proofreading services. The publisher may cite a published article of the author from another journal, which was the source where they identified the author's email. Common strategies used for solicitation included: 1) promising a fast-tracked and guaranteed publication, 2) using compliments that appeared to be inappropriate, 3) repetitive emails, and 4) using argumentum ad passiones to induce guilt. The common features of the webpages of those publishers included: 1) open access publishing as the only option, 2) extensive list of indexing services excluding well-established indexing agencies, and 3) the publisher has a huge collection of journals in different disciplines.ConclusionIt is hoped that these findings will help junior researchers in psychiatry to stay vigilant to avoid falling into the trap of predatory publishers, which may result in financial loss and loss of work to plagiarism. Total eradication of those predatory soliciting emails is unlikely despite the advancement of spam filtering technology, which necessitates a more united effort from different stakeholders to come out with a probable solution.

AimsDespite the abundance of opportunities available for medical students to explore the field of psychiatry, active immersion through experiential learning has proven to be difficult for pre-clinical year students as a result of a busy time table and the need to wait for psychiatry postings during the clinical years. Hence, the question of “how to implement experiential learning of psychiatry in pre-clinical years” arises. This study is aimed to elucidate the attempts that have been made to use research as a proximate approach to learn psychiatry experientially, focusing specifically on the challenges faced and lessons learned by a pre-clinical medical student.MethodThis self-study outlined the informal three-months learning-by-doing journey of a year-one medical student, supervised by a psychiatrist registrar. Employing research as a proximate approach of experiential learning for psychiatry was explored based on reflection from discussion during supervision meetings and messages exchange. The agreed learning method was an active involvement in research projects on psychiatry topics, with the learning outcome of producing publications.ResultThe challenges faced included: 1) the difficulty associated with striking a balance between an ambitious project with high impact versus a feasible smaller project to keep both parties motivated through the means of short-term accomplishment; 2) the ongoing requirement for learning process adjustment to build the foundational knowledge essential for progress. Through active and deliberate effort, every step in the process was found to be an opportunity for active learning. Literature review, for example, was used to build the understanding of psychiatry topics and practise critical appraisal skills, while allowing for the recognition of knowledge gaps, which ultimately encouraged future research idea synthesis. The process of writing and submitting a manuscript was used to learn publication-relevant skills including: journal impact calculation, referencing, indexing and abstracting services, and publication ethics. Certain future proof skills were also developed, including literacy in information and communication technology which improved efficiency of research, problem solving and decision making. This was done using pros and cons whenever difficulties were faced.ConclusionAlthough research is not a comprehensive substitute for clinical posting in the process of learning psychiatry, the lessons learned from psychiatry research can potentially serve as an initial exploration tool for preclinical-year medical students interested in the field. The stimulating process has found to be effective in stimulating further interest in psychiatry but maintaining it will be the next challenge.

A significant amount of research has been found to have inaccurate references, reflecting the need to learn how to cite and reference effectively at the early stage of an academic writing career for junior healthcare professionals. Hence, this short communication serves as a beginner’s guide to referencing by addressing key aspects, including relevant terminologies, reference styles, tools that facilitate the referencing process, and citation accuracy. Learning referencing skills can be a good start if a junior researcher does not know where to start in publishing.