PHA 2020 International PH Conference and Scientific Sessions

[Vanessa Vaile]

Nope, nor planning to attend any conference of any kind at anytime in the foreseeable future. It’s not just about the expense although that factors in. A scholarship won’t cover everything, and, short on disposable income, I need to keep money (or a low card balance) aside for necessary items not covered by Medicare or Medicaid. The wheels on my utility cart are starting to go, I may need a new A/C window unit come summer, and I’d like to swing three wheel e-bike someday. All take priority over conference going.

Imo if PHA really cared about sharing the conference experience and collective insights and information, they would live stream, archive entire sessions (which they did years past) and publish presentations online. The complete PHA sessions from years back are still better and more useful than the short videos posted now. As a former academic, I’ve never been a conference fan. On top of all that, it’s too long and tiring a trip by train. Between the oxygen hassle and climate ethics, I’m done with flying (but too old to play Greta Thunberg).

[Brittany Foster]

I totally wish I could go to this conference. Something that was really hard for me to do with the congenital heart disease conference that I attended a few years ago was the FLIGHT! I had to really recover from my flight for weeks. The whole few days that I was there really seemed to wear me out. I would really love to be able to go, but medically it is probably not in my best interest right now. Do they ever record any of the sessions like in a LIVE on Facebook or Instagram? This would be cool to do, or even to post afterwards so those that are unable to attend can hear what was talked about and get the information too.

[Colleen]

@brittany-foster that’s what @vanessavaile mentioned as well – streaming and archiving the sessions to benefit those who can’t attend. I wonder if there is a reason they stopped doing that. Maybe there were privacy concerns?

We came so close to attending a PH conference with out son the year my son was diagnoses. We received the scholarship but had to ask them to pass it on to someone else because Cullen was not well enough to travel. It’s a shame that during his 5 years living with PH it was never a good time for us to go. I always felt like we were missing out because the parents and kids who attended that we knew had nothing but good things to say about it.

[Brittany Foster]

@colleensteele I am sorry this happened when you tried to attend the conference. I know firsthand how life can get in the way of things that we really want to do sometimes. It has gotten in the way of me going to a few conferences and even a few vacations that I had to miss out on. I usually love going to anything like this that is informative and that will be able to benefit my mom too. I know that at the heart conference she really enjoyed connecting to the other parents. It was cool to see her in a setting that made her feel less alone! I’m sure she felt the same when she saw me with everyone too.