On Tuesday 22nd March 2023 we welcomed academic collaborators, funding partners and some very special guests to P&J Live to join together with friends and colleagues here in-person in Aberdeen.
This event signified the official transfer of adminstrative responsibility for the Centre to University of Aberdeen, and included a full 24 hour programme of social and work events, with updates from all key CMHW work packages and studies, and cross-cutting research themes.
Festivities kicked off with a pre-meeting dinner at Hilton TECA on the Monday evening, including a fantastic post-dinner talk from Benjamin Ellis from Versus Arthritis, who gave his thoughts on what it means to generate impact from our research (a key focus of the remaining part of the Centre’s grant period).
The next morning delegates assembled next door at P&J Live venue, which adjoins the hotel, for our Research Meeting proper. The event was kicked off with a fantastic keynote lecture from Dame Professor Carol Black, one of the UK's most eminent figures in the field of rheumatology, and author of the 2008 report ‘Working for a healthier tomorrow'. Dame Professor Black led us on a journey through the recommendations, challenges and progress in the past 15 years of ‘Health, well-being and work’, with a key message that now is a key time for us to continue with the Centre’s focus on maximising the effectiveness of the impact of the great research produced so far under the collaboration.
This was followed by a full day of updates across all the CMHW's key work packages, including updates on our workplace (Centre Co-Director Professor Karen Walker-Bone, University of Southampton - coming live via pre-recorded video), healthcare (Professors Gwenllian Wynne-Jones and Ross Wilkie, Keele University) and public health (Dr Rosemary Hollick, University of Aberdeen) themes. Talks also covered key cross-cutting themes across all Centre work, including presentations on research impact on policy and practice (Dr Elaine Wainwright, University of Aberdeen), making the business case for work and health interventions (Drs Martin Eden and William Whittaker, University of Manchester) and work on key work and health outcome measures (Professor Ira Madan, King's College London / Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust, and Margarita Ravinskaya, UMC Amsterdam).
We wrapped up the day with a series of short presentations looking to the future of the Centre before Centre Co-Director Professor Gary Macfarlane (University of Aberdeen) outlined some exciting plans for how to continue the legacy of the Centre after the current grant comes to a conclusion.
All in all, the event was a great success, with everyone relishing the chance to get together and engage and discuss our various research projects, future plans and potential synergies in a face-to-face setting at this fantastic venue. We’re already looking forward to our next full-group meeting in 2024, and hopefully there will be many interactions across the whole Centre team, both in person and
All at CMHW would also like to extend a huge thanks to all of the staff at both Hilton TECA and P&J Live for making sure everything ran incredibly smoothly, all speakers and presenters, and to all CMHW delegates, researchers and other staff members who have contributed to all the great work produced so far whether they were able to attend the event or not. A big thanks also to Epi Group member Jisha Babu for her fantastic coordination of event logistics!
We look forward to seeing you all again next year!
You can read more detail about the event on the CMHW website here.