My recent visit to the BOFAS conference.
A few weeks back I attended the British Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society (BOFAS) conference in Bournemouth. The first BOFAS conference post-Covid pandemic after 2½ years.
It was quite nostalgic driving to Bournemouth as it brought back memories of driving from London to Southampton during my podiatry degree.
I was very excited to attend – for many, it was the first face to face conference since the pandemic, but I had been lucky enough to have attend a conference back in October 2021.
The programme looked intriguing and I was starving for some new insights in the world of Foot & Ankle.
I have realised that research actually fascinates me, but more than anything else, I was keen to meet everyone, especially the Allied Health Professionals (AHP) who I had not seen since the 2019 Nottingham Conference. I also keen to catch up with some of the Registrars who worked with us at St Mary’s hospital, and had now, progressed to Consultant level.
There is something very gratifying to observe when a Registrar progresses to their full potential, and that they are going to be excellent at their chosen career. It makes me very proud that I had been part of their journey.
What is the BOFAS Conference?
BOFAS normally holds an annual scientific conference. The location varies and is usually held in the town of where the chairman is based, but that is not always possible. The team at BOFAS are fair and hold it one year in the south and one year in the north, making it easier for delegates to attend.
It is a 3-day conference whereby one day has been dedicated to AHPs which has been a brilliant addition to the programme especially for the likes of professionals like myself.
This AHP day has been a collaboration between BOFAS and the Association of Foot and Ankle Physiotherapists (AFAP) and other allied health professionals and has been a total success.
The founding members of AFAP, who all work very closely with foot & ankle consultants in the NHS, floated this idea to BOFAS in 2011 in Windsor and this new baby was born in 2012 in Newport, as a half day, initially. It is also an opportunity to mix with other liked minded professional and lectures are supported by foot & ankle consultants and AHPs. As always, it has been a great resource for all who attend and it gives a chance to share and compare ideas of how we could improve the service too.
Although I has been working with F&A consultants since 2009, I did not attend my first conference until 2015 at Guildford and only attended for the half day. I am not sure why I took so long to attend! I remember feeling rather scared and felt like ‘Billy No Mates’. I knew the physiotherapist from my hospital but she was busy with the organising the event – so it wasn’t like I could sit with her. I saw some people I knew vaguely but actually the cat had got my tongue. I know! Rather hard to believe as my husband can testify, that I could talk the hind legs off a donkey but I felt completely out of my depth.
But once inside the lecture hall, I felt very much at home and enjoyed what I had learnt. That evening, after the AHP day, there is a gala dinner and I noticed an excitement between the consultants and the AHPs. They were all getting dressed and it is was being held at the some fancy place – at Mercedes Benz World. I actually felt like I was missing out – probably suffering from fear of missing out. I decided there and then to attend the full 3 days because it would be an excellent to meet liked minded people who work in a similar environment. I also noticed that my consultant was rather chilled out and we had a conversation about normal things. Sometimes you forget that consultants are actual people and they have to do all the things everybody else does. Because of their professional status, I tend to hold them in the highest regard, up on some pedestal, but they are just normal people.
Since 2016, I have been a permanent delegate for the conferences and I have visited cities that I would not have normally visit. I did feel nervous when I attended at the first times for the 3 days but what I thought was so special was that the AFAP team looked after us – the ‘Billy No Mates’ group and went out of their way to make us feel very welcome!
Each year at the conference, the content varies and covers topics that has not been discussed previously or we learn new content. It keeps me up to date within the world of F&A. I have met some incredible people and learnt a lot (probably needs another blog on what I have learnt) and enjoyed myself. My husband always states that I am off to have a jolly for 3 days. There is this element, but at the same time you are in a room filled with these brilliant ideas and you learn just as much.
On the first evening of the conference, it is normally dinner with the Reps for all consultants and their respective teams but the AFAP team would actually invite all of us to meet them for a drink or dinner, and if we attend the gala dinner, we would all sit together so nobody felt lost. And if their consultant is passing by in the foyer/dinner table to say hello to them, we are all introduced to them. I have never met such a friendly team of AHPs and F&A consultants.
In 2017, the conference was held in Sheffield, and some of the Consultants in this area can sing, so they performed for us. They practised online as one of the lead band members lived in the States – prior to the existence of Zoom but on facetime. The band is called Toejam – (very apt I thought until I understood what it meant – it is not a term we Brits use very often) but it is an American term which refers:
‘…to the smelly gunk which can accumulate between toes. When feet are sweaty or not washed often, toe jam may be more likely to result’.
They created an equally amazing logo to go with Toejam.
My Toe Jam T-shirt.
As a band, they were fantastic and again after the hard day of engaging all your grey matter from 9am to 6pm, meant we all enjoyed the music vibes with some alcohol! The entry into this gig was only possible if you bought a Toejam T-shirt’ for charity.
This year the conference was in Bournemouth, and as I stated I was so excited to meet all the AHPs, and my current F&A team from St Mary’s. I arrived on the Tuesday evening and met the AHPs for dinner. It had been too long since we met up!
Again, the conference did not disappoint, especially as this was the first conference for 2.5years. The conference started with one of the Radiologist consultants on the first day and he stated he was used to being with the F&A team on a Wednesday morning at 8:45am as he would normally be with us in our Multidisciplinary team meeting in St Mary’s and he was used being heckled by our lead consultant – made the rest of our team of cheer for him!
There were very few AHPs this time around but it just meant we got to spend more time with each other and other consultants. One of them even managed to arrange a dinner for us with the Reps which was extremely entertaining followed by going to see the Toejam perform their ever last gig!
The AHP day was a great success and I came away feeling that I needed to go back and study. I was greatly inspired by Dr Seth O’Neill who is physiotherapist and lectures at University of Leicester.
Dr Seth O'Neill has an interest in Tendon disorders, mainly Achilles Tendon (AT), and during this event, I kept thinking about how the AT can be quite difficult to treat. Sometimes when they rupture, and it can take a while to heal especially if they are obese, diabetic or osteoporotic.
During Seth's lecture, he mentioned that most of the studies tend to exclude patients with comorbidities but these are the patients that we would see in clinic and I wanted to look into this further as why they don't heal as well as others. I also wondered if ethnicity, gender had anything to do with it as I have a few female family friends who have also suffered from AT rupture and have a taken a long time to heal.
The thought kept nagging me and I wondered if I could explore this further. It led me to reach out to Seth a few weeks back and to discuss this further. This is still only in the exploration stages but it has got all my grey matter fired up. It will also be a true test on our marriage as I am sure it is hard to go back into studying after 25 years or so. My husband is probably secretly pleased as he will have less nagging – always a bonus for him!