Are international medical conferences an outdated luxury the planet can't afford? No

doi:10.1136/bmj.a351

BMJ 2008;336:1467 (28 June), doi:10.1136/bmj.a351

Head to Head

Are international medical conferences an outdated luxury the planet can’t afford? No

James Owen Drife, professor of obstetrics and gynaecology

¹ Leeds General Infirmary, Leeds LS1 3EX

j.o.drife@leeds.ac.uk

Every year thousands of doctors and scientists fly to meetingsat distant locations. Malcolm Green (doi: 10.1136/bmj.a358)argues that this is no longer justifiable or necessary, butJames Drife believes face to face contact is hard to replace

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Last week I resolved to give up international conferences. Itwas at 5 am in a hot Asian airport, after waiting an hour forsomeone to stamp our papers. In the plane I cooled down andreflected that it could have been worse. At least I didn’thave food poisoning this time. On balance the trip seemed worthwhile.Women in that resource poor country needed better health care.Our conference may not have done much to help them, but I woulddo even less by staying home and sulking.

But I suppose this debate is about big conferences in posh places.It is easy to be cynical about them. Medical journals keep expressingdoubts, from an urbane Lancet editorial in 1957¹ to a BMJ coverin 2003 depicting doctors as pigs fed by pharma reptiles.² In2008 our guilt is expressed as concern about carbon footprints,³so I should start . . . [Full text of this article]

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This article has been cited by other articles:

Leong, J. J, Kinross, J., Taylor, D., Purkayastha, S. (2008). Surgeons have held conferences in Second Life. BMJ 337: a683-a683 [Full text]

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