Welcome to the next SBNS meeting

We look forward to welcoming you to the spring meeting of the SBNS here in Birmingham from the 22-24th April 2009. The conference is being held in a state of the art conference centre in the ultra-modern Millennium Point building. Your short walk there from the city centre will allow you to enjoy the attractions of the rejuvenated and exciting Bullring shopping centre. The city centre boasts excellent shopping, restaurants and entertainment. 

This meeting comes at a time of dramatic change for the University Hospital Birmingham and our rapidly expanding neurosurgery department. A new 1100 bed ‘super hospital’ is nearing completion on the current Queen Elizabeth Hospital site and we look forward to a new era for neurosurgery incorporating the latest technology such as intra-operative MRI. In addition we are privileged to work with the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine, providing neurosurgical services to our armed forces. Our meeting will begin with a ‘lifelong learning’ seminar on battlefield injuries of the head and spine and will be an excellent overview of the topic for neurosurgeons at all levels of experience. This initiative builds on my colleague Graham Flint’s experience of running previous meetings on battlefield injuries.

Continuing with the trauma theme we are delighted that our keynote speaker will be Mr Ross Bullock of the University of Miami, who will lecture on recent advances in neurotrauma. Mr Richard Kerr of the University of Oxford will update us on aneurysm management, Mr Graham Flint will talk on Syringomyelia, Prof Garth Cruickshank on the current management of brain tumours and we will hear about the work of the supra-regional orthopaedic oncology service from Mr Seggy Abudu of the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital here in Birmingham. This will be of particular interest to spinal neurosurgeons. I am also pleased that we have strong support from our industry partners with companies from around the world attending this meeting. We will have an extensive trade fair this year offering an unrivalled opportunity to discuss the latest technologies available to our patients.  

This meeting is open to all those who work with neurosurgical patients and I hope that we will see an increased number of nursing staff attending this spring. Please spread the word among your nursing colleagues and encourage them to attend. 

No matter which area of neurosurgery you specialise in you will find the meeting varied and exciting. While you are in Birmingham don’t miss out on the attractions of the Balti triangle, Chinatown, Sushi at Selfridges, Shopping at the Mailbox, the Barber Institute of Fine Arts, Symphony Hall, and the list goes on! Don’t miss out on our gala dinner. This will be held at the newly refurbished Town Hall where the highlight will be an organ recital on the magnificent 70 feet high Georgian organ built in 1834. It promises to be a spectacular highlight to our meeting. 

I look forward to seeing you in Birmingham.

Yours sincerely

Jonathan Wasserberg
Local Host

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