It has been an eventful and special year for Millbrook Medical Conferences, too, being the 30th anniversary of the business. Bouncing back from the pandemic, Millbrook Medical Conferences (Millbrook) organised 50 meetings in total: an increase of 26 from 2021! Of the 50 conferences, 24 were e-conferences or webinars, whilst 26 were in-person and hybrid conferences. Millbrook returned to some major cities throughout the UK, and visited some new ones, including Derby, Galway, Glasgow, London and Manchester, managing a total of 13,485 attendees worldwide!
By providing medical practitioners in several different disease areas with accessible medical education through a variety of different conferences, Millbrook is facilitating them with the knowledge they need to make informed, and often lifesaving decisions, as well as contributing to vital medical advancements. This education is vital to the NHS as well as private and international healthcare systems to improve patient outcomes and the standard of healthcare for all, forever.
Before Millbrook Medical Conferences begins chapter 2023, the business is reflecting on some of its best bits of 2022 outside of organising conferences.
In 2022, Millbrook and Managing Director Fiona McDonald were delighted to have been shortlisted for the Best Legacy Award within the ABPCO Excellence Awards. The nomination focuses on the legacy and impact Millbrook and Fiona has and continues to have on medical education. To support its application, Millbrook was invited to submit a short video and, as you can tell, the Millbrook team had a lot of fun filming it.
Millbrook turned ‘the big 3-0’ last year and such a milestone could not go unmarked. In the run up to the anniversary, the Millbrook team went on an undercover operation to create a celebratory video for Fiona. The mission involved contacting her former colleagues, family and friends, and asking them to record a short congratulatory message, which were all collated into one long video. On Friday 11 November, the team travelled down to London for a ride on Funicular’s The Murdér Express, where they enjoyed an immersive theatre dining experience to celebrate the business and all its achievements.
Millbrook began the year continuing its work as the secretariat for the British Cardiovascular Intervention Society (BCIS), which is just shy of 2,000 members! In 2022, Millbrook organised a total of 22 conferences for BCIS, equating to approximately 55 hours of education. The meetings included educational forums, dedicated sessions for AHPs, consultants and trainees and its flagship conference Advanced Cardiovascular Intervention (ACI). BCIS ACI 2022 was a rip-roaring success, educating over 900 delegates and giving every single one of them the opportunity to participate through a dedicated app and education dome.
Millbrook also strengthened its relationship with Valve for Life UK as its administrator. Valve for Life UK aims to increase access to transcatheter heart therapies in the UK through various means, including the Valve for Life UK bus tour, which made headlines on Sky News last November. As the administrator for Valve for Life UK, Millbrook maintains the Valve for Life UK website, social media channels and assists in internal and external activities.
Millbrook expanded its team employing Patricia Sloneczny (also known as Trish) as Operations Assistant. Previously a Director of Quality, HR and CSR in the construction industry, Trish joined Millbrook in March to support the management team in the development and maintenance of quality management systems. Since joining Millbrook, Trish has refined Millbrook’s current processes and procedures adding to the already robust health and safety requirements and ensuring they are complied with. Trish is committed to supporting the management team with the day-to-day running of all office functions to ensure the safe and smooth running of the business and development of all employees.
In June, Millbrook also welcomed Sarah Davies (better known as Sarah D to avoid confusion) to the team as a Marketing Executive who supports Business Development and Marketing Manager Sarah Moore on everything digital at Millbrook. Sarah D keeps Millbrook on the map, taking care of several social media channels and communications, as well as writing articles and case studies. Sarah D graduated from the University of Bedfordshire with a first-class degree in Magazine Journalism.
If you are a @MillbrookMed Twitter follower, you will know that Millbrook ran its own version of Channel 4’s the Great British Bake Off in September, aptly named the ‘Great Millbrook Bake Off.’ The team enjoyed sweet and savoury treats from a Kinder Bueno drip cake and Tres leches cake to moreish bread and sausage rolls! Millbrook can officially reveal that Sarah Moore won the Great Millbrook Bake Off with her yummy eclairs!
To support the exponential growth of the company and Executive Conference Managers, Millbrook is recruiting for a Conference Organiser and an Events, Societies and Clubs Administrator.
2022 has been an outstanding year and with many new business enquiries, 2023 shows promise of being another busy and successful year!
Thank you for supporting Millbrook throughout 2022.
Millbrook Medical Conferences has reached an exciting milestone as it celebrates three decades of organising first-class medical education.
Millbrook Medical Conferences (Millbrook) was established in 1992 by Managing Director Fiona McDonald during her maternity leave after realising a need for the service whilst working within the NHS as a secretary.
Fast forward 30 years and Millbrook is a multi-award-winning business that serves healthcare professionals worldwide by ensuring the delivery of high-quality education through its range of in-person, virtual and hybrid conferences.
Millbrook has received many accolades since its inception, most recently in October 2022 when it was named as a finalist within the ABPCO Excellence Awards for the Best Legacy Award. The nomination focuses on the legacy and impact Millbrook and Fiona has and continues to have on medical education. Wish Millbrook luck when the winners are announced on Friday, 9 December at Birmingham ICC!
In the lead up the anniversary, the Millbrook team were working behind the scenes (and did very well to keep schtum!) to create a special 30th birthday video for Fiona. The Millbrook team reached out to Fiona’s previous colleagues, family, and friends old and new, and were overwhelmed with the response. The aim was to get 30 people to record a short congratulatory message, which were all collated into one long lovely video. Before setting off to the capital for a fun-filled evening, the team shared the video with Fiona over a glass of fizz, who was bowled over by the messages of thanks and well wishes.
The 20-minute video featuring the Millbrook team, Adrian Banning, Dan Blackman, David Gershlick and Nick Curzen to name just a few, is available to view in the video below.
Afterwards, the team headed down to London for a ride on Funicular’s The Murdér Express, where they enjoyed an immersive theatre dining experience to celebrate the business and all its achievements in style.
For Fiona, the surprises didn’t stop there as the Millbrook team had a wall mural specially created to mark the 30th birthday. The wall art contains a collection of words and locations of significant importance to the business and its growth, depicted in different sizes.
Here’s to another 30 years of organising high-quality education!
Fiona McDonald, Managing Director of Millbrook Medical Conferences, is delighted to have been shortlisted for the Best Legacy Award within the ABPCO Excellence Awards.
Fiona is recognised for her tireless dedication to organising first-class medical education through the establishment of Millbrook in 1992, which today serves healthcare professionals worldwide by ensuring the delivery of first-class education through a range of in person, virtual and hybrid conferences. In the last ten years alone, Millbrook has educated over 10,000 medical practitioners and organised 371 conferences!
By providing healthcare professionals in several different disease areas with accessible medical education through a variety of different conferences, Millbrook is ensuring the facilitation of the knowledge they need to make informed, and often lifesaving decisions, as well as contributing to vital medical advancements. The education is vital to the NHS as well as private and international healthcare systems to improve patient outcomes and the standard of healthcare for all, forever.
Speaking of the nomination, Fiona said:
“I’m flattered to have been put forward for this prestigious award. When I founded Millbrook Medical Conferences 30 years ago, I was aware of the need for professional, high-quality, accessible and focussed medical education.
“Looking back over the years I’m so proud that, along with an incredible team, we have gone some way to filling this gap and moving forward our intention is to continue to provide these hugely worthwhile face-to-face conferences and increase the access globally via streaming or viewing on-demand video footage.
“The reason I am so confident of our future challenges is because, even after 30 years, I continue to love coming in to work knowing that I have a fantastic team supporting me.”
BCIS Lifetime Achievement winner Fiona is nominated alongside the ICC Wales team for its work on Protect Duty and ExCeL London which has nominated EASL for the International Liver Congress 2022.
Winners of the awards will be announced on Friday 9 December at Birmingham ICC. Click here to find out more and book your tickets. Shortlisted candidates for all categories were selected by an independent panel of judges, and the winners of four of the awards will be decided by delegate judging prior to, and during the event.
The award was presented during the main programme of the conference, with a speech given by both Prof. Nick Curzen and Fiona McDonald.
In his speech, Nick thanked Fiona for her dedication both to providing first-class education to interventional cardiology over the last 30 years, and to the Society, through the organisation, and growth of ACI, and more recently for the flawless administration of the Society.
Fiona thanked the Millbrook team and her family for their support in building Millbrook since its inception 30 years ago. She also, thanked the Society for taking a chance on her back in 2004.
One Lifetime Achievement Award is presented each year during the conference, often to Society members who have dedicated their lives to supporting the Society, or to those who have contributed to major advances in interventional cardiology over their career. The president, honorary secretary and treasurer of BCIS work together to make the decision.
This year took a slightly different approach by recognising Fiona and her work through Millbrook, who have worked with BCIS since 2004 on the ACI conference. Fiona has overseen nine presidential terms and knows the society better than most.
Millbrook’s involvement since 2004 has been integral to the growth of this conference from restyling the exhibition and thus increasing sponsorship significantly, reworking branding and design and improving communications across the board. With Millbrook’s input, new education platforms such as live case transmissions, simulator demonstrations and interactive patient case discussion groups have been introduced. Furthermore, Millbrook provides delegate and faculty logistical support for ACI.
Not only are Millbrook key to the success of ACI, but Millbrook also took over the administration of the Society in 2020, and over the past two years has supported all aspects of the society, from working group support, council meetings, membership management, new website creation, financial and budgetary support and marketing. Millbrook have been praised by BCIS for our fast response to queries and for our dedication to supporting and advancing the Society in any way that’s needed.
Despite the challenges, we had a great year!
Millbrook organised 24 conferences in total. Of those, 16 took place online, five were in-person only, and three were hybrid taking place across Manchester, Nottingham, Surrey, Cardiff and London. We were delighted to be able to hold face-to-face conferences again after a year of online-only events. It was fantastic to be able to catch up with familiar faces and enjoy the interaction and benefits of in-person education once again.
Millbrook’s conferences received a total of 8,695 registrations from across the world in 2021. We reached China, the USA, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Greece, Italy, Germany, Spain, Croatia, Romania, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, India, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, and many more countries. It makes us very proud to know that we have helped educate thousands of HCPs across the world, allowing them to provide the very best care to their patients. Ultimately, the provision of first-class medical saves lives and we love being a small part in enabling this positive impact on society.
In addition, Millbrook were finalists in the ABPCO Excellence Awards for our work in transforming an annual, multi-track, three-day, face-to-face meeting into a highly successful digital meeting in 12 weeks. You can read more about it here.
We also launched the Millbrook Hub, a single event platform to showcase our virtual events. Allowing registered delegates to use one link only to access all upcoming Millbrook e-conferences. In addition, the Hub contains all the content from past e-conferences and webinars. Currently, the Hub has a library of 19 conferences and over 90 hours of education available to watch on-demand. Read more about the Hub and gain access here.
Finally, our team grew by two, as we welcomed back Tilly Broadbent as conference coordinator, who has worked with us in the past, and we welcomed Chloe Tyler who joins us as administration assistant.
We wanted to share these milestones and statistics with all the people that helped to make this happen. Whether you have been a delegate at one of the conferences we have organised, a member of faculty, a course director, or a sponsor, thank you for supporting us this year.
The last two years have taught us so much, we feel ready for a new challenge in 2022 and we’re going to make this our best year yet.
The award was presented during the main programme of the conference, with a speech given by both Prof. Nick Curzen and Fiona McDonald.
In his speech, Nick thanked Fiona for her dedication both to providing first-class education to interventional cardiology over the last 30 years, and to the Society, through the organisation, and growth of ACI, and more recently for the flawless administration of the Society.
Fiona thanked the Millbrook team and her family for their support in building Millbrook since its inception 30 years ago. She also, thanked the Society for taking a chance on her back in 2004.
One Lifetime Achievement Award is presented each year during the conference, often to Society members who have dedicated their lives to supporting the Society, or to those who have contributed to major advances in interventional cardiology over their career. The president, honorary secretary and treasurer of BCIS work together to make the decision.
This year took a slightly different approach by recognising Fiona and her work through Millbrook, who have worked with BCIS since 2004 on the ACI conference. Fiona has overseen nine presidential terms and knows the society better than most.
Millbrook’s involvement since 2004 has been integral to the growth of this conference from restyling the exhibition and thus increasing sponsorship significantly, reworking branding and design and improving communications across the board. With Millbrook’s input, new education platforms such as live case transmissions, simulator demonstrations and interactive patient case discussion groups have been introduced. Furthermore, Millbrook provides delegate and faculty logistical support for ACI.
Not only are Millbrook key to the success of ACI, but Millbrook also took over the administration of the Society in 2020, and over the past two years has supported all aspects of the society, from working group support, council meetings, membership management, new website creation, financial and budgetary support and marketing. Millbrook have been praised by BCIS for our fast response to queries and for our dedication to supporting and advancing the Society in any way that’s needed.
The award was presented during the main programme of the conference, with a speech given by both Prof. Nick Curzen and Fiona McDonald.
In his speech, Nick thanked Fiona for her dedication both to providing first-class education to interventional cardiology over the last 30 years, and to the Society, through the organisation, and growth of ACI, and more recently for the flawless administration of the Society.
Fiona thanked the Millbrook team and her family for their support in building Millbrook since its inception 30 years ago. She also, thanked the Society for taking a chance on her back in 2004.
One Lifetime Achievement Award is presented each year during the conference, often to Society members who have dedicated their lives to supporting the Society, or to those who have contributed to major advances in interventional cardiology over their career. The president, honorary secretary and treasurer of BCIS work together to make the decision.
This year took a slightly different approach by recognising Fiona and her work through Millbrook, who have worked with BCIS since 2004 on the ACI conference. Fiona has overseen nine presidential terms and knows the society better than most.
Millbrook’s involvement since 2004 has been integral to the growth of this conference from restyling the exhibition and thus increasing sponsorship significantly, reworking branding and design and improving communications across the board. With Millbrook’s input, new education platforms such as live case transmissions, simulator demonstrations and interactive patient case discussion groups have been introduced. Furthermore, Millbrook provides delegate and faculty logistical support for ACI.
Not only are Millbrook key to the success of ACI, but Millbrook also took over the administration of the Society in 2020, and over the past two years has supported all aspects of the society, from working group support, council meetings, membership management, new website creation, financial and budgetary support and marketing. Millbrook have been praised by BCIS for our fast response to queries and for our dedication to supporting and advancing the Society in any way that’s needed.
On Monday, December 7, the Association of British Professional Conference Organisers (ABPCO) hosted its annual Excellence Awards. The ceremony rewards excellence and professionalism in the world of association events, recognising professional conference organisers and event industry partners for their contributions to the industry. As you may expect, this year was a little different than normal with awards ceremony taking place virtually, allowing the attendees to vote for category winners and view presentations from nominees and winners.
For 2020, an additional award category was added, the Lockdown Hero Award, which recognises the professional conference organisers who have worked against the odds to create events during the COVID era. Millbrook was presented with the special award for its work in facilitating the Imperial College COVID-19 Cardiovascular Conference with two other organisations also recognised as Lockdown Heroes.
The live webinar was Millbrook’s first virtual event, taking place on Thursday, April 2, 2020, with just a 10-day lead time, no budget and the need for a significant global audience. This was important to ensure this vital information on COVID presentation in cardiac patients was shared worldwide to implement change and save lives.
The programme comprised of four highly-engaging sessions featuring 29 talks from 32 members of faculty. Within 10 days, a global audience was generated of over 5,600 participants across all four continents including delegates from Morocco, the USA, India, Norway and Sweden. Post-event, the webinar was made available on-demand and so far has generated a total of 9,300 viewers.
Millbrook managing director Fiona McDonald commented:
“During this extraordinary year, Millbrook, like all professional conference organisers needed to evolve for the COVID era. We have learnt how to use multiple virtual event platforms to become self-taught virtual event specialists in a very short time frame.
“I am so proud of the work our team has undertaken to ensure that medical education can still take place despite being unable to organise traditional face-to-face conferences. It’s been a huge learning curve, but we are extremely proud that Millbrook has facilitated the sharing of important COVID information to physicians worldwide.”
Barbara Calderwood, ABPCO co-chair, added:
“In a remarkable year we expected remarkable entries, and our membership truly delivered.
“ABPCO members demonstrated creativity, flexibility and tenacity as they organised events under very different circumstance compared to anything they have done in the past. Thank you to all our members for submitting their entries and well done to our worthy winners, who were chosen through a mixture of audience voting and judges’ marks.
“Through the addition of the Lockdown Hero awards we were also able to recognise a new breed of member, those who stepped out of their comfort zone and did something different for their clients, peers and audiences.”
ABPCO membership provides reassurance to prospective clients seeking the services of a professional conference organiser that their event is in safe hands. ABPCO members have been verified by both ABPCO and their peers and are recognised for their skills and experience within conference organisation.
Members of the Millbrook Medical Conferences team have been re-acknowledged by ABPCO in 2020 for their services to conference management. Fiona McDonald is recognised as a full ABPCO member honouring her 27 years within the industry during which she has organised hundreds of conferences and events across the UK and overseas. Full membership also recognises Fiona’s position as managing director of Millbrook Medical Conferences.
Lizzie Head, Emma Robinson, Rebecca Hopper and Harriet Sullivan are recognised as associate members of ABPCO. This level requires a minimum of two years’ experience of all services required in the preparation and running of conferences, seminars and/or other meetings. Applications for associate membership must be supported by references from at least two clients or venues. In addition, detailed reviews of the applicant’s last two conferences are submitted before consideration by the ABPCO executive committee before accreditation is approved.
Recognition from ABPCO is testament to the hard work and professionalism shown by the executive conference managers at Millbrook Medical Conferences. If you would like to find out more about our conference services or are looking to obtain a tailored, no obligation quote please contact us through the form on our website here.
If you would like to find out more about ABPCO, click here.
