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The Sleep Apnoea Trust is holding it's annual conference once again this Saturday (3rd November) and I for one will be in attendance.
Anyone else going to the event?
Anyone else going to the event?
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Do you know where it is this year? -
Tingewick Hall at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, they have held it there the last 2 years that I have attended.
Anyone wishing to go should contact the Sleep Apnoea Trust as it is always well attended and places are limited and must be booked in advance.Comment
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Seems like it's fully booked:
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SATAday 2007 Report
After the initial registration and obligatory cup of coffe I went for a wander around the stands. There were a few more vendors at the conference this year:
covidien (UK) commercial (TYCO)
Respironics UK
Breas
deVilbiss
Resmed
Air Products Healthcare
Fischer & Paykel
Conspicuous by their absence from the alloted stand were Viasys Healthcare!
Respironics were giving 50% off of all of their masks, just by giving the Reps their details to be logged with their customer sservices team, people could then contact respironics at their leisure, stating that they had spoken to the reps about the half price offer and that's it, 50% off.
Resmed were late in setting up but soon built up a crowd of interested CPAPers. Air product were new to the conference and offered a chance of winnign a DAB radio on the day by giving in current details and doing a draw at the end of the conference. I was not the lucky recipient on this occaision!
The conference was a sell out with all 300 tickets being sold. After the opening speech by the SATA Chairman (Brian Spires), there was an interesting talk by Dr Jason Pepperell on the MOSAIC (Multi-centre Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Interventional Cardiovascular)trial, which is being supported by SATA. MOSAIC aims to study the effects on Cardiovascular Risk by the use (or lack of) CPAP. Anyone who would like further info on MOSAIC can find it here.
Professor John Stradling then gave an Update on the NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) CPAP Appraisal, which appears to going very well with an announcement to be made in the next couple of months. By all indications this will mean that PCT's will have 3 months to put in place a system for offering Sleep Apnoea referals and/or treatment (by law). There are some legal lopopholes that PCT's try to use to get out of their responsibiltites (as was the case with the drug "Herceptin") but ultimately they have to provide treatment.
Two SATA members, Sally Chesson from Sussex and Pat Vaughan from Cornwall then gave their stories on trying initially to get diagnosed to their ultimatley being treated for Sleep Apnoea, both different and both interesting.
The AGM was then held and after the relection of officers (the only change being the retirement of Denise Roberts as Secretary, and Wendy Cockburn as the new Secretary) some adjourned for lunch (including myself) and some stayed for the beginners basics talk by Dr Rob Davies.
After a very good lunch part of which was spent chatting with the Earl of Buckinghamshire wjho is SATA's patron, (they do provide a good spread, healthy too!) we ajourned into smaller groups in lecture theatres for chatshops.
The chatshops are split into surname group s such as A-E F-L etc, and are comprised of short 20 minutes discussion groups each with a different lead such as with Sleep Nurses, Consultants, Dr tim Healing (editor of Sleep matters and a CPC user) on Travelling with CPAP, as he does regurlarly as a medical advisor for a charity (can't remember which one) to some very non-CPAP friendly places (such as Sierra Leone where he used a car battery bought whilst there!) , a long standing sufferer and his wife for Partner issues
and a Sleep Unit registrar for general CPAP questions.
The Raffle was then held in the main hall and some very good prizes were on offer:
A Large Hamper (won it last year, no such luck this time)
2 Night Stay in a Hotel
Lunch for 2 at Raymond Blanc's restuarant
Ipod
Golf day for 4 people at Waterstock Golf Course
2 tickets for the OLD VIC to see Cinderella (best seats)
Race day for 2 at Newbury Races
Christmas Turkey
Christmas Turkey (yes there were 2, no I didn't muck it up)
Large bottle of Brandy
20 CD mixed music Pack donated by Unversal Music
20 CD mixed music Pack (yes there were 2 of these also)
Sandwich Toaster
Set of 4 books by Terry Gaskin (who is SATA's media contact)
Hair dryer
Bottle of Talisker (donated by Professor Stradling)
Gent's Watch
Basket of Fruit
Napkins and Silver wine bottle stoppers
A Rose Plant
Finally 2 items were up for auction, a Honda F1 team shirt which was auctioned after the day and a Team Jacket which was auctioned for £50, both items were donated by Team Honda.
That is about it from this year, a full and interesting day for all who attended (in my opinion of course).
A question put out to the floor by Professor Stradling was whether the staged delivery of CPAP could be replaced by a one stop shop, such as Going for a Sleep study, the results being processed by the consulting team in the morning and a cpap issued the same day sort of thing. Most users agreed that the shock of coming to terms with iot was not as much of an issue as the generally long wait for a machine.
A debate for another day I think!!!Comment
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Thanks for the low-down Peter!
I guess if your are born named Tom Healing, becoming a doctor is the only right thing to do. Or an injury-prone pro footballer I guess
(I recently read about a Dr Killing - not so fortunate as Dr Healing)
I'll have to go next year, it's in my diary already.
Did you recruit any new forumers by any chance?Comment
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