BACCN Conference 2021 – Virtual

Date: September 2021
Venue: Online virtual platform – Reattendance

About

The BACCN Conference takes place annual and generally attracts between 400-500 critical care nurses from across the UK and beyond. The BACCN National Board made the decision in late 2020 that they would not revert to face-to-face events in 2021 and instead invest the time until the second virtual Conference ensuing that delegates would experience the best virtual experience possible, building upon their experiences of their first virtual event in 2020.

Echo’s Involvement

We were very aware that delegates would be tired of the standard zoom/online meetings and that we needed to have a focus on the mental health and wellbeing of nurses after the unprecedented time they had experienced since the beginning of the pandemic. We therefore interspersed the programme with alternative options such as a virtual zumba class, a virtual choir Welcome Reception, an online quiz and a “Laughtercise” session. 

The virtual conference was this time hosted in Ascot, following a last minute closure of the originally booked venue in Windsor due to a severe staff shortage in the wake of Covid. There were 13 Board members, 7 AV team and 1 conference organiser present onsite. Every other presenter and all delegates attended virtually.

The programme consisted of 6 plenary and 4 parallel breakout sessions across two days. On Sunday 13th, conference opened with the virtual AGM followed by the Welcome Reception via Zoom, which incorporated a virtual sing along with the ICULibertySingers choir master Kari.

The main programme consisted of 5 keynotes, 6 workshops, 39 concurrent presentations, 44 posters, including 25 pre-recorded poster presentations. In the evenings, the delegates were invited to join a virtual welcome reception and virtual Gala Dinner via Zoom.

The virtual exhibition area included a unique page for each sponsor, where they could have a video presentation, company profile, product details, links to their own site and staff contact information. We also incorporated short 5 minute sponsor presentations which were placed similar to advert breaks between sessions.

Conference in numbers:
• 211 delegates logged into watch the conference online
• 12 sponsors