Looking Back as Meeting Program Chair
By Patricia D. Scherrer, MD
Last May, I had the privilege of serving as Meeting Program Chair for the 2011 SPS Conference, held at the Radisson Plaza Hotel in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, our institutional sponsor, hosted the SPS Sedation Provider Course® on May 22 on its Minneapolis campus. Over 201 physicians, nurses, dentists, child life specialists, and other allied health professionals attended the meeting, including providers from South Korea, New Zealand, Australia, and Canada. We had a bit of an adventure during the provider course on Sunday – a tornado touched down only a few miles from the hospital, so our intrepid participants and faculty were evacuated to the basement and listened to lectures in the hallway. Other than that, it was all smooth sailing!
Our theme for the main conference last year was “A Clearer Vision of Quality in Pediatric Sedation”. We really focused our lecture and breakout session topics on quality in all aspects of pediatric sedation care, from program development to clinical care to research and beyond. J. Michael (Mick) Connors, MD, SPS President, started the meeting off with a thoughtful keynote presentation, reviewing some of the historical aspects of how pediatric sedation has “come to be,” and presenting some of the challenges and opportunities for quality metrics as we go forward.
Cheri Landers, MD; Richard Lock, MD; Carrie E. Makin, RN, BSN from Kentucky Children’s Hospital offered us insight into their very collaborative and interactive pediatric sedation care relationships between disciplines. Judy Zier, MD reviewed program development and the many benefits of incorporating nitrous oxide into the pediatric sedation armamentarium. Valerie Houser, RN provided a fantastic overview of the developing specialty and expertise of pediatric sedation nursing. During the lunch hour on Monday, we received a preview of the many superb abstract and poster submissions vetted by the SPS Research Committee, and Dr. Connors presented awards for the best abstracts of the year. The 2011 Abstract Award recipients were Arvind Rampersad, MD from Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital in Cleveland, OH and Lisa Dryer, RN from Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, MO.
We focused more on research and metrics on Tuesday morning. Mark Roback, MD and Joseph Cravero, MD spoke about the importance of definitions for our work, both in characterizing the quality and safety of our care and in defining sedation-related adverse events. We continued our Annual Research Year in Review panel discussion, reviewing timely topics from the recent pediatric sedation literature. Lia Lowrie, MD provided us with opportune information about advocating for quality sedation programs within our organizations, and Gregory Hollman, MD rounded out the main lectures with an overview of the development and growth of the pediatric sedation program in Madison, WI. Dr. Hollman was named the recipient of the 2011 Joseph P. Cravero Leadership Award, presented to him by Dr. Cravero himself.
One of our biggest highlights this year was the increased number of breakout sessions available to conference attendees. These sessions offered specific content more tailored to individual backgrounds, interests, and practices. Although negotiating the session schedule was certainly more involved, the number and variety of presentations was very well received. The expertise and hard work of all of the many breakout session presenters was pretty phenomenal to see!
I really had a fantastic experience as Program Director, and I am eternally grateful to all of the many folks with SPS, and to our exhibitors and sponsors, who helped to make the meeting such a success. I am looking forward to attending the conference in Cleveland this year!
