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BASHH column
BASHH annual conference Daniel Richardson,1,2 Elizabeth Foley3 Conferences organised by medical societies are an important calendar event of the academic, professional and social lives of medical specialties. It is estimated that globally there are more than 10 000 medical meetings per year.1 Accessing continuing medical education has become more challenging due to significant time and financial pressures on clinicians and scientists. Moreover, there are some serious arguments for not holding scientific conferences: the carbon footprint of holding such events (eg, the 2007 American Thoracic Society conference in San Diego generated an estimated 10 779 tonnes of carbon from air travel); there are little data to support the educational value and patient benefits of scientific conferences and the potential negative impact of industry-supported educational events.1 2 The scientific and clinical applications of sexual health and HIV have made historic advances in the past 40 years and continue to do so, for example HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (HIV-PrEP) and Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccination. Clinicians and scientists have more access to online and virtual education; however, the paradigm of the scientific conference away from home to hear experts and researchers present their most recent data has not died and still has advantages, for example networking with colleagues, sharing ideas on research and service delivery. The BASHH annual conference took over from the Medical Society for the Study of Venereal Diseases (MSSVD) conference in 2003 holding its first event in Bath in 2004. The conference is a 3-day event with a gala dinner on the second evening with prizes and networking. The responsibility for organising the conference is an elected BASHH officer post (the conference and communications secretary) who is also responsible for other educational events, such as joint
1
Brighton & Sussex University NHS Trust, Brighton, UK; Brighton & Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK; 3 Solent NHS Trust, Hampshire, UK 2
Correspondence to Dr Daniel Richardson, Sexual Health & HIV, Brighton & Sussex University NHS Trust, Eastern Road, Brighton, Brighton BN2 5BE, UK;
[email protected]
560
BASHH-FSRH meeting, joint BASHHRoyal College of Physicians meetings and commissioning this BASHH column. Every few years the conference secretary advertises for future local hosts/cities to hold the conference: enthusiastic and innovative local hosts take some responsibility in organising the social events: welcome reception, speakers’ dinner and gala dinner and has traditionally been a fun and rewarding role. Despite the current uncertainty existing in clinical services particularly in England, the BASHH conference has become more popular than ever, attracting 602 delegates in Oxford in 2016 which compares to 483 delegates in Bristol in 2013. The conference has made efforts to attract non-medical clinical colleagues, undergraduates and scientists by introducing symposia and abstract sessions for nurses, health advisers and undergraduates and increasing the size and make-up of the conference scientific committee to represent the larger sexual health and HIV community. Peer review of scientific conferences’ abstracts have been heavily criticised for their academic vigour.1 The 2016 BASHH conference had a scientific committee of 38 physicians, nurses, health advisers and scientists, 22 of which were women who all reviewed and scored 50% of the 328 abstracts submitted. The committee rank each abstract and select the highest ranked abstracts for orals presentations, only rejecting around 4% of submitted abstracts. Each year following the conference, delegates are asked what they value most and least in the BASHH conference and the conference has evolved as a result: we no longer joint events in the USA; the number of oral abstracts has been increased (from 21 to 56); registration rates for undergraduates, nurses and health advisers have been reduced; a dedicated plenary session on reproductive health has been incorporated into the programme; we have introduced a scholarship programme to support up and coming researchers to attend the conference and conference abstracts are published in a peer-reviewed journal supplement (http:// sti.bmj.com/content/92/Suppl_1.toc). Delegates say that they value networking over and above any other attribute of
the conference and this is more important than ever given the challenges of managing clinical services and research units in the UK. In 2016, the welcome reception and gala dinner were more popular than ever, building on current and future professional relationships and networking. What about the future? The BASHH conference is heavily reliant on industry support who in turn hold symposia and exhibit: industry support may not be sustainable in the future which will affect registration fees and quality of venues and other associated conference benefits. There is good evidence that interactive learning which enhance participant activity can effect change in professional practice and didactic sessions are not effective in changing clinician performance.3 The BASHH Conference needs to become more interactive with its delegates increasing opportunities for voting and comment and moving away from longer didactic plenary sessions. Medical conferences will disappear if clinicians and scientists stop paying attention to them, if they do not give them value nor attend them.1 The BASHH conference is currently flourishing, underpinning the UK’s sexual health and HIV community, however, is heavily reliant on the contribution from BASHH members and fellows to maintain this event and more importantly support the moving landscape of medical conferences with ideas and innovation for medical education. Competing interests None declared. Provenance and peer review Commissioned; internally peer reviewed.
To cite Richardson D, Foley E. Sex Transm Infect 2016;92:560. Sex Transm Infect 2016;92:560. doi:10.1136/sextrans-2016-052837
REFERENCES 1 2
3
Richardson D, Foley E. Sex Transm Infect December 2016 Vol 92 No 8
Ioannidis JP. Are medical conferences useful? And for whom? JAMA 2012;307:1257–8. Green M. Are international medical conferences an outdated luxury the planet can’t afford? Yes. BMJ 2008;336:1466. Davis D, O’Brien MA, Freemantle N, et al. Impact of formal continuing medical education: do conferences, workshops, rounds, and other traditional continuing education activities change physician behavior or health Care Outcomes? JAMA 1999;282:867–74.
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BASHH annual conference Daniel Richardson and Elizabeth Foley Sex Transm Infect 2016 92: 560
doi: 10.1136/sextrans-2016-052837 Updated information and services can be found at: http://sti.bmj.com/content/92/8/560
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