The 59th European Medical Writing Association (EMWA) Conference

Well, that went too quickly! 

The end of the 59th European Medical Writers Association (EMWA) conference, this time in Riga. 

For me, this was the best one so far. This time I moved well outside of my comfort zone by presenting in front of others. I have not presented for many years; this was daunting and thrilling at the same time. 

I would like to thank those who made this possible for me.

🌻 Evguenia Alechine, PhD, ELS, for inviting me to present my freelance journey at the 'Getting into Medical Writing' seminar.

🌻 Jules Kovacevic and Sarah Milner for inviting me to the Expert Seminar Series, 'Children-centric communication - unmet needs, barriers, and the future', where I finally met the inspirational Bojana Mirosavljevic in person!! Even if she did make nearly the whole audience cry with her beautiful, emotive video of children with Batten disease. Bojana successfully lobbied the Serbian parliament for Zoya’s law, which increased access to early diagnosis and newborn screening in Serbia. ​Also, Begoña Nafría Escalera for introducing their mission at the children's hospital in Barcelona, for Patient Engagement in Research Area (PERA).

🌻 To the EMWA Education committee for allowing me to run an Expert Discussion Group on writing with the paediatric population in mind, and to the experts who came to discuss best practices and ideas for improvement.

🌻 Adriana Rocha, PhD for running this year's Freelance Business Forum and inviting me to moderate a table discussion on managing client relationships.

🌻 My fellow Inclusive Language workshop leader, and partner in crime, Laura C. Collada Ali, and all the participants who contributed to make it a very interactive session.

Equally, I would like to thank Daniel Newman for coming as a patient advocate, telling medical writers why accessible and inclusive language is essential, and the impact non-inclusive or non-adapted materials can have on patients. It's a subject I have been pushing for many years, but it has much more impact coming directly from a patient, rather than a medical writer. 

It was also lovely to see pharmaceutical representatives Karen Hinkle and Sebastian Florescu, PhD showing us examples of how they are implementing the patient input into children-focused materials. 

All in all, a brilliant time was had. Catching up with old friends and making new ones was just the icing on the cake 🍷 . Thank you all for making it so special. See you next year!

#emwa59 #patientadvocacy #medicalwriting #inclusivelanguage #medcomms