From the 2012 AMWA Annual Conference

Greetings again. I’m now back from the American Medical Writers Association (AMWA) annual conference.

This year, the conference was in Sacramento, California, USA. As usual, it was designed mainly to educate attendees.

Educational activities at the conference included workshops, open sessions, and breakfast roundtables. There also were poster presentations, networking events, exhibits, and more.

I gave workshops during much of the conference. Therefore I couldn’t attend many other sessions. However, I enjoyed and learned from the sessions that I did attend.

I especially enjoyed the keynote address. This address was by Dr. Neal Baer, a physician who has worked on many popular television shows. Illustrating his talk with video clips, Dr. Baer emphasized that fictional stories on television can help educate the public about medicine and public health. He also emphasized that social media can multiply the impact of such stories.

I also especially liked the acceptance address by Dr. Susan Aiello, who received AMWA’s highest award. Dr. Aiello, who is the editor-in-chief of The Merck Veterinary Manual, discussed her love of books. Her talk included advice on keeping books in good condition. It also included showing of a video titled “Birth of a Book”.

As noted last year by an AuthorAID community member, good conferences about communication of science take place in many countries. If you attend such a conference, I hope that you’ll volunteer to write a guest blog post. To do so, you can send me a message through the AuthorAID website.

Until the next post—

Barbara