WSPOS congress: traversing the time zones

November 3, 2020 Miriam Langeslag-Smith

The fifth World Congress of Paediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus was scheduled to be held on 2-4 October 2020 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Unfortunately, the global Covid-19 pandemic put a stop to this. However, a crisis can spur innovation. The World Society of Paediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (WSPOS) didn’t let pandemic restrictions stop it from organising a great learning opportunity, transforming the conference into a smartly timed virtual symposium, WSPOS World Wide Connect 2020, with the slogan, Give us 24 hours and we’ll give you the world.

 

A novel delivery

 

The programme consisted of 14 sessions, spread over 24 hours. The first session started at 9am Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST), while the other side of the world slept. Each time zone had four sessions before the sessions started again in the next time zone - AEST was followed by Indian Standard Time and then British Summer Time, finishing with US Eastern Standard Time. Holding the sessions in four different time zones, allowed participants to watch live as the conference moved into their part of the world. The content has also been made available for the next three months for registered participants who would like to see them or revisit them on-demand.

 

During the virtual conference itself, each session was made up of four to five speakers who had pre-recorded their presentations. At the end of each session, the speakers were live via Zoom for questions, which participants had logged in an online chat room during the speaker’s presentation. The question and discussion session was led and supported by two moderators. Although all the presenters were in their own home, office or hospital, it still felt like they were together and the discussions were lively and interesting; I could almost feel I was in the room with them.

 

Each session was an hour long, with 15 minutes between them and a half-hour break between time zones, giving you the opportunity to stretch your legs or make yourself a much-needed cup of tea.

 

Satellite sessions and more

 

Just like a real conference, there was even more on offer including: 124 free papers (consisting of six slides) and 63 posters (three slides), some with pre-recorded explanations from the authors; and three additional satellite sessions covering:

 

  • UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh - Rare diseases: paradigm shifts in management
  • Essilor’s Stellest lens – a new spectacle lens for myopia control and one-year clinical trial results
  • Inherited retinal disease and emerging gene therapy options - Managing the paediatric patient

 

There was even additional bonus sessions: the ESCRS/WSPOS symposium - Paediatric intraocular implants: where are we now?; and a Best of the best session with three keynote speakers and the best papers, posters and videos.

 

Highlights from home and further afield

 

New Zealand was represented by Rebecca Findlay from Auckland University who presented her poster, Refractive error in children and eye movements while reading, which reached the top five of best posters. Dr Paul Cohen from Northland District Health Board had a free paper - How to be a ‘one-man-band’ paediatric ophthalmologist in a developed country, but in a rural area with limited resources, and still make a difference.

 

For me, personally, the session on anomalous head posture was an eye opener I was not expecting. I discovered that even the experts don’t often consider that a visual field defect could be the cause of a torticollis (compensatory head posture) in a child. I also found Clinical Assistant Professor Kyle Arnoldi, programme director at the Ross Eye Institute in Buffalo, NY, very brave in attempting Goldmann visual field assessments in children from as young as four.

 

In the discussion part of the nystagmus session, it was particularly entertaining to listen to ophthalmologists with years of experience in nystagmus disagree on several topics. None were afraid to vocalise these differing opinions, making for a very lively discussion.

 

In conclusion

 

The advantage of having sessions available on demand is that I can review them at my leisure. Although I missed a trip back to my home country and the interaction with colleagues from across the world, I felt this was a very successful virtual ophthalmology event. Even the inevitable technical glitches improved as the day went on.

 

This new way of delivering conferences could be the way of the future: they are accessible to everyone; and there’s no expensive plane tickets and accommodation costs. Instead of one or, at the most, two of us attending, the entire paediatric ophthalmology team at Counties Manukau Health were able to ‘attend’. This led to some intense and ongoing discussions in the week following the conference at work, something that wouldn’t have been possible if only one of us had attended the physical conference in Amsterdam.

 

Miriam Langeslag-Smith is an orthoptist originally from the Netherlands where she trained and worked before moving to New Zealand several years ago. Currently an orthoptist for Counties Manukau Health in South Auckland, she completed a Master of Science degree in 2013 focusing on amblyopia and vision screening.