Barts MS at ECTRIMS 2017

In just over a week, MS researchers, Nurses and Clinicians will travel to Paris for the annual ECTRIMS conference. This is an important meeting where new research, trial results and treatment information is shared across the community. And we'd like some input from you, our readers!

For the past few years, the Barts MS team have tried to get this information out to the readers of the this blog as quickly as possible. 

We have a range of activities over the three day event; posters, stands (Digesting Science and Clinic Speak), presentations and social media sessions. So again, we invite you to get involved!




Ways to get involved in the Burning Debate:

The aim of the Burning Debate is to get two top researchers to discuss a burning topic from the field of MS Research. This year the topic is: Rumble in the Jungle: B cells vs. T cells. Our two speakers will argue over whether MS is a T-cell mediated disease and if B-cells are therefore less important. 

The debate will take place on Thursday 26th October from 3.45-4.45pm in Hall D. 

We have Dr David Hafler arguing FOR the motion and Dr 
Stephen Hauser arguing AGAINST. The debate will be chaired by Dr David Wraith. Unfortunately the debate will not be live streamed, but we will be covering it on Twitter where you can follow the discussion by searching for the hashtag #burningdebate. A twitter feed will be projected in the debate room, so any comments or questions will be voiced. 


At the end of the debate, the BartsMSblog twitter account will post two tweets, one FOR the motion, one AGAINST. The tweet that is re-tweeted the most will win the debate. A secondary aim of the debate is to encourage clinicians to use Twitter in their professional capacity. 

Ways to get involved in the Hangout:

The aim of the Hangout is to get MS research presented at ECTRIMS out to you ASAP. Two of our best presenters, Neuro Doc Gnanapavan and MouseDoctor will be presenting live for one hour on Friday 27th October from 3:45pm - 4:45pm , summing up what they have seen throughout the week. This was our video from last year.

This is a great opportunity for you to find out about specific presentations that you're interested in. Check out the conference programme here, and either email us or post a comment on this article with any sessions or posters that you would like to know about, and we can try our best to send someone there and will report back in the Hangout. 

So, you can either watch the Hangout on the Barts MS Blog google+ channel, on our You Tube channel or sign up and join the discussion. As this is a Hangout On Air, lots of people can watch the discussion but only 10 people can join and ask questions. If you join the discussion (rather than just watch the video live), your camera will be turned on so if you want to remain anonymous, it's maybe better to email us your question. If you would like to be invited to join the discussion and be notified when the discussion starts, email us your details: bartsmsblog@gmail.com We'll also be checking our twitter, so you can tweet us a question on the day.