Dear Colleagues, DevelopingEM Delegates and Faculty,
Well another DevelopingEM event has come and gone and we would just like to thank you for your enthusiastic support in making DEM2016 Sri Lanka a conference to remember.
We hope you agree that it was an amazing event and we hope the relationships made during the conference will continue to grow and develop in the years to come.
Our conference model does not work without your registrations as these, as you know, are our sole funding source.
This model means you are all an integral part of the DevelopingEM team and responsible for the process.
We, as the management team, will be forever grateful for your support.
Although the breakdown of your registration charges was presented at the conference I think it’s important to remind you, as members of the team, of the breakdown of your contributions as well as what these funds allowed us all to achieve.
For a full delegate paying $USD1200
- $USD564 went towards venue costs and I’m sure you will agree this was money well spent with spectacular supportive venues
- $USD180 went to administrative costs including outsourced event management, insurance, legals, college fees and merchandise (there is no payment to the medical management team)
- $USD84 went towards IT support
- $USD48 went to planning meetings both in Australia and Sri Lanka
- $USD24 went towards marketing
- Most Importantly $USD300 went to supported attendance of regional and local delegates at the conference and workshops
This local delegate support was offset by a small local registration fee for the 185 Sri Lankan attendees, however the 14 regional delegates you supported attended free of any charge.
The first 9 applicants for support from the region had their flights and accommodation covered by you as well.
The local nursing delegates also had their registration costs completely covered by you.
Your support allowed 219 attendances at various workshops by local and regional colleagues, with many attending more than one workshop.
The toxicology workshop was also partly funded due to donations from the Toxicology and Poisons Network Australasia (TAPNA) and we are most grateful for their support.
In summary you have all achieved a great deal both in an immediate and long term sense and the feedback from local and regional delegates has been overwhelming, very heart warming and eloquently summarised by one of the key members of our faculty, Nilantha Lenora.
“DevelopingEM has effectively inspired an entire generation of emergency physicians in Sri Lanka and the ripple effects will be there for decades to come.”
We have reasons as a group to feel just a little proud of our collective achievements and once again we would like to thank you for your support.
There are a few other things we need to mention before we let you get back to your busy lives.
Opportunities for Ongoing Educational Assistance in Sri Lanka
With the enlivened interest in EM and critical care as a result of the conference there is a growing group of trainees who are hungry for your assistance with their ongoing education.
DevelopingEM’ers Nilantha Lenora, Nick Taylor, and James Salway are involved in an EM educational capacity building project in Sri Lanka to complement what’s being offered locally and would like to appeal for you to stay involved and offer whatever time and skills you can devote within the EM/Critical Care/Tox/Paeds/PreHospital realms via some of the following opportunities:
- Virtual Grand Rounds
- Deliver a 30-60 minute lecture for Sri Lanka EM registrars online via Skype/Google Hangout
- Flexible scheduling, conference sessions tend to fall on Fridays
- Virtual Mentoring
- Serve as a mentor/advisor/role model to a group of 2-3 Sri Lankan EM registrars
- Time commitment: 1 x 60 minute group online mentoring session every 1-2 months over Skype/Google Hangout
- Virtual Journal Club
- Offer faculty-level review for online journal club forum hosted by Sri Lanka EM registrars
If any consultants from around the world are interested in making a lasting impact on the education of a future EM physician in Sri Lanka via the above opportunities or others, please contact Dr Nilantha Lenora nlenora@gmail.com for more information.
Conference Presentations
There were many requests for copies of the conference presentations. We hope to have all the presentations and video uploaded to our website soon. Our previous conference presentations can be found here.
Conference Photos and Videos
We are aiming to have photos and video from the conference uploaded to our website and Facebook page soon. If you would like to add your own media either send it to us or upload it via Facebook.
Feedback
We are always happy to hear your feedback, both positive and negative. DevelopingEM has changed many aspects of our process based on delegate feedback and we aim to stay approachable and flexible. We’re still on a steep learning curve when it comes to marketing and any advice on how to promote DevelopingEM in your region would be very much appreciated.
Staying in Touch with other Delegates
Without pre-approval we cant release our delegate details but if you are happy for us to make your contact details available for other delegates please let us know and we will create a 2016 detail database.
Probably the easiest way to stay in touch would be through our Facebook and Twitter Pages. Feel free to join us here, upload your photos from the conference and post your thoughts. The instant messenger service on Facebook is a great way to communicate as well.
Thank you’s
There are so many people to thank but chief amongst those are our Sri Lankan Organising Committee without whom this event would not have been possible.
We would especially like to thank the core members of this team
- SRILAL DESILVA
- NILANKA WICKRAMARATNE
- HARENDRA AND THERIKA COORAY
- RANJANA SENEVIRATNE
- ASANGA MIGHLEHEWA
- CHULA GOONASEKERA
- GANAJA SAMARAJIWA
- IYANTHI ABEYEWICKREME
- KRISHANTHA JAYASEKERA
- MITHRAJEE PREMARATNE
- ROHAN DISSANAYAKE
- SANATH RAJAKARUNA
- SENAKA GUNATILAKE
- SENAKA RAJAPAKSE
Without you we would not have had an event and we are forever grateful for your enormous efforts and support. To our incredible faculty who have joined us from around the globe, you really are the core of this conference. Your generosity is unbelievable.
You have as a group made DevelopingEM what it is and we hope to continue building on an amazing group of clinicians as the years progress. In particular we must thank our Program and Workshop leads for herding the cats and getting everyone in the same place at the same time.
- AMILA PUNYADASA
- APRIL KAM
- BRIAN WRIGHT
- CHULA GOONASAKERA
- FATIMAH LATEEF
- JOHN SERRA
- KATE CURTIS
- KEERTHI WANASEKERA
- MARGARET MURPHY
MATT DAWSON - MICHAEL DOWNES
- NATALIE THURTLE
- NICK TAYLOR
- NILANTHA LENORA
- PETER CAMERON
- PETER TAILLAC
- RANJANA SENEVIRATNE
- RAVINDRA FERNANDO
- RICARDO HAMILTON
- ROBERT SCHWANER
- SHANE CURRAN
- SRILAL DESILVA
- STEPHANIE DONIGER
Thank you and we hope to work again with you very soon.
To our support staff for keeping everyone happy
- KATIE DERRETT
- THERIKA COORAY
- LIZ MAY
- BRENDON SHORT
- RICHARD VIMALASADAN
- ONELLA DESILVA
- EROSHINI SAMARASINGHE
Thank you for your hard work over the last year and especially during the conference.
Last but not least, to our wonderful delegates from Sri Lanka and beyond. I think we’ve collected together a wonderful group of people with a common ethos.
Thankyou DevelopingEMers. Without you we would literally not have a conference.