World-leading speakers draw thousands to Virtual Clinical Chemistry Summit 2020
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July 31, 2020
Thousands of scientists, health professionals and scientific manufacturers from across the globe have come together online to discuss the latest diagnostic and point-of-care solutions at the SelectScience Virtual Clinical Chemistry Summit.
Launched by Bath-based science publisher SelectScience® after COVID-19 forced the cancellation of key events, the 2020 series of Virtual Summits offer a crucial platform for the science industry to continue to connect and share knowledge at this critical time.
With more than 6,600 total attendees of ‘live’ webinar presentations and virtual exhibit booths over 3 days of last week’s Virtual Clinical Chemistry Summit, the event featured presentations by eminent speakers, technology workshops, virtual exhibitor booths from leading brands, downloadable resources, as well as 1-on-1 webcam chats and dedicated networking sessions for attendees to maximize connections.
Explaining the significance of the event, keynote speaker Prof. John McLean, Stevenson Associate Professor of Chemistry at Vanderbilt University, said: “Internationally, this moment underscores our collective need for rapidly tailorable enhancements in clinical chemistry – we need to come together as a community to tackle these challenges facing humanity.”
With 31 presentations, the most popular drew crowds of over 550 live attendees, far more than most physical shows, while the themed networking sessions — a new feature of this latest Summit — also proved a big hit, with the cardiovascular disease (CVD) discussion group attracting over 120 participants for lively scientific debate. Content from the Summit proved of wide interest and reached tens of thousands of people online as word quickly spread on social media.
SelectScience Editor-in-Chief and Publisher, Kerry Parker, said: “Our new Virtual Summits are designed to support the industry at this difficult time to ensure communication and collaboration continues to flourish.”
“It’s been fantastic to be able to offer a platform to these speakers right at the forefront of their fields and we’ve been delighted by the response from across the industry.”
Other speakers at the Summit included Dr. Frank Peacock, Baylor College of Medicine, Prof. Michael Laposata, University of Texas Medical Branch-Galveston, Dr. Alan Wu, San Francisco General Hospital and University of California San Francisco, Dr. Richard Kay, University of Cambridge, Olubunmi Martindale-Sheldon, Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust, Prof. Zobair M. Younossi, Inova Fairfax Hospital, Prof. Rob Christenson, University of Maryland, Felicity Dempsey, POCT Consultancy Services, Dublin, Ireland, Joe Paul Gallo, Denton County Health Department, Dr. Ankur Srivastava, Southmead Hospital.
A number of manufacturers presented their latest technologies available to the field, including SCIEX, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Beckman Coulter, MilliporeSigma, Waters Corporation, Luminex, Siemens Healthineers, QIAGEN, ELITechGroup, BD Biosciences Europe, to name a few.
Missed the live event? Don’t worry – all presentations are available to view on demand>>
Headline topics include COVID-19 and infectious diseases, cardiovascular disease, omics, diabetes, point-of-care testing, clinical mass spectrometry, clinical microbiology, and more.
Speaker Felicity Dempsey, who also led the Pont-of-Care Networking Session along with Joe Gallo and Olubunmi Martindale-Sheldon, said: ”I was very impressed by the whole presentation of the summit from the time you logged on and you found yourself in the virtual lobby! It was a fun and yet very professional experience. I was honored to take part and reach out to all my colleagues around the world and see some familiar names popping up in the chat rooms.”
She added: “I really hope you will continue to host similar events as it looks like COVID is going to be around for a while.”
Dr. Wu said: “People are still hungry for information, especially when they are currently unable to travel and attend conferences, so this is a great opportunity for me to present what I am trying to accomplish in my work.”
Prof. Christenson, who led the CVD networking session, added: “Without this ‘venue’ for presentation we would be unable to share and gain knowledge on critically important topics.”
More SelectScience Virtual Summits coming soon, topics include:
- Biopharmaceutical
- Neuroscience
Additional SelectScience Virtual Summits and Webinar Series available to watch on demand include:
