The annual BAETA conference was held this year in Cardiff. I was lucky
enough to go (along with 65 other delegates) and, on the suggestion of John
Ryan, I've taken it upon myself to give you all a report of the meeting
(gossip excluded - not that there was any...........that I noticed anyway!!)

The setting was the tranquillity of St. Mellons Country Club, with its
beautiful gardens and luxurious golf course  - made all the more attractive
by 3 solid days of rain!

All the more attention on the interesting selection of speakers.

It was great to see so many young trainees there, as us oldies slowly start
to fall of the ladder.

The conference got off to its usual start with a free paper session on
Sunday afternoon. The prize (a bottle of champagne) was won by Dr Helen
Draper from Kingston Hospital, Surrey, with an interesting presentation on
"Rapid occupational therapy intervention for safe discharge of patients
attending an A&E department".

The common-or-garden BAETA curry was substituted for a fine chinese meal in
Cardiff city centre that evening with wine flowing, songs sung and of course
the cheque provided by BAETA funds. The long wild night out in Cardiff
halted only by the lack of any premises open serving alcohol after 10.30pm,
but all was not lost as the bus took us back to St Mellons where an
unmentioned few supported the bar and night porter till 20 to 6 in the
morning.

A surprisingly good attendance on Monday morning for the opening speaker.
The
theme of the conference was 'A&E - past, present and future', and over the
next 2 days we listened to some inspiring talks on issues such as risk
management, other departmental stresses in life as a consultant, how to kill
your patients (in the hidden toxicological sense) and life-adventures around
the world in A&E.
On Monday afternoon, Dr Peter Driscoll from Manchester spoke to us about the
FFAEM examination - a very informative lecture, leaving myself and the 5 or
6 other soon-to-be examinees very pale and anxious. It was far more
information than the faculty had provided directly and  soon should  be
summarized on the BAETA page of the BAEM website.
Another significant piece of information was given to us by Dr Keith Little
as an added-on section to his talk on millennium planning. This was about
the
cut in A&E trainees from 329 to about 70 over the next 5 years; this has, of
course, already been much discussed over this very medium.

Back to the current BAETA celebrations and the traditional black tie dinner.
The food and wine went down well, unsettled only by some of the tasteless
jokes to follow -a few were genuinely funny! The evening was rounded off by
a
lively disco playing anything but rap and rave (phew!).

Tuesday mornings talks were the future of A&E - some flavour of which I've
already mentioned above.

The conference closed with the BAETA business meeting - a first for a high
proportion of the committee voted in at Belfast. Certainly the first one
chaired by myself. There were no riots, uncontrolled arguments or severe
beatings, so a relative success. Full minutes will be available at the next
BAETA meeting at the Faculty meeting in London (3rd-4th December) and also
hopefully posted on the BAETA page of BAEM website.
But the important issues raised were:

1. The issue of associate membership of BAEM: this was discussed and has
been made available to A&E trainees at a reduced cost since BAEM in Belfast.
Moving from full to associate membership however also forfeits your voting
rights on any BAEM matters, for little financial gain once you've paid the
additional fee required for the journal.


2.The independent BAETA website has been closed and BAETA issues will be
displayed on the BAETA page of the BAEM website. 2 separate sites seemed
excessive.

I hope this has been informative for those of you who couldn't make it to
Cardiff and an inspiration for those of you who didn't know if it had any
purpose.

I'll end with the first official advert for BAETA 2000 in LIVERPOOL.
Thursday, Friday and Saturday in mid/late September 2000, dates yet to be
finalised. For academic quality, loud and lively company and an introduction
to the nitelife of Scousers -----not to be missed!


A rather lengthy contribution as my first on this mailing list - I've only
been a listener until now. I think I'll go quiet again for a while.

Elspeth Worthington
SpR Mersey Region, BAETA President 99/00.







%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%