Learnings from Asia's first ever medical student neurosurgery Conference: NEUROFEST, 2022

The study lays out the design and learnings of Neurofest, Asia's first ever medical student Neurosurgery conference organized by Walter E Dandy Medical Student Neurosurgery Club, India. Neurofest was conducted in October 2022 inclusive of various events: workshops, talks and contests. An online post-conference questionnaire was disseminated among the delegates to record their experience and feedback for the conference. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS with a level of significance p < 0.05. Of the 158 total delegates, 65.2% (n = 103) participated in this study. The majority of the responders were satisfied with the events at the conference. 85.4% (n = 88) of the respondents reported an increased interest in neurosurgery, probably due to the quality of workshops (p = 0.004), talks by faculty (p = 0.023), contacts with the faculty (p = 0.025) and confidence in approaching a faculty (p < 0.001). 92.2% (n = 95) of the respondents claimed to recommend Neurofest to their colleagues. The reasons for this were found to be the quality of workshops (p = 0.001) and confidence in approaching a faculty (p = 0.030). Nearly all respondents believed that such conferences are important in empowering medical students (n = 100, 97.1%). Similar conferences are required to provide medical students with early exposure to neurosurgery. In the future, continued research is required to optimize neurosurgical conferences and endorse the prospect of neurosurgery as a career option in Lower-Middle Income countries.