Twelve tips for organising a local or regional e-poster session

Abstract

E-posters have been increasingly incorporated into medical education conferences over the past few years, but since the disruption to the 'traditional' conference circuit as a result of COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 they have become a necessary tool for larger national and international conferences to support ongoing scholarship dissemination. The authors of this article also recognise the potential for smaller-scale e-poster sessions to be organised at local or regional levels to either continue, or establish new, special interest groups and smaller medical education research networks. Our 12 tips article is designed to offer practical advice to support the implementation of local or regional e-poster sessions to potential organisers and is written from the perspective of two medical educational researchers with experience of designing e-posters and organising virtual conferences which include e-poster presentation sessions.easily be adapted between conferences and re-used as opposed to needing re-printing in different sizes/formats to comply with individual conference guidance.Whilst larger conference organisations have the funding and infrastructure to support highly technologically advanced conference platforms, e-poster sessions could be adapted to support scholarly dissemination at local or regional levels using more modest technological options, and in fact could encourage the establishment of new communities of practice within medical education research. We offer our 12 tips to organisers of local/regional e-poster sessions covering the four broad topics of: (a) planning an e-poster session, (b) inviting and instructing presenters, (c) conducting the e-poster session, and (d) sharing experiences with the medical education community. We hope to inspire confidence to utilise e-posters more in the longterm to support more scholarly dissemination, particularly at local and regional levels. Tip 1. Consider Whether An E-Poster Session is Right for Your MeetingE-poster sessions are growing in popularity and may seem more straight-forward than organising oral presentations (or full face-to-face conferences), but before committing to this format consideration needs to be given to whether they suit the purpose of your meeting. Do e-posters cater to the type of information that you would like to disseminate in your meeting, or would oral presentations/workshops be more appropriate? Also consider your likely audience: Will they be able to attend e-poster sessions 'live', or prefer to have asynchronous access to the e-posters? Finally, do you think that the audience will engage with an entirely virtual format, or would they prefer more traditional, face-to-face conference experience? Tip 2. Gather Your Team E-poster sessions require preparation, execution and evaluation, and each of these three broad stages are underpinned by many tasks to ensure success of the event. Whilst achievable by a single individual, this would be put huge demands on one's time and limit the creativity borne out of collaboration. Ideally, a minim...

Creating a conference poster: Out with the old and in with the new, moving from the traditional to the improved modern poster format

“…This has become popular due to technological advancements, but also necessary due to the disruption to the "traditional" face-to-face conference as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. 10 There are many advantages to e-posters when compared with traditional paper posters, including the environmental impact as e-posters do not require printing. 11 One further advantage to e-posters is that they can be easily amended and revised for future conferences without the need to re-print.…”

“…Hyperlinks can also be added to e-posters, which allows the reader to access further information if they wish to do so. 10 QR codes and hyperlinks may also be used to direct the end user to interactive materials, quizzes and surveys. Another key feature of the new poster format is a one-sentence take-home message with the QR code beside for more detail (Figure 2).…”

“…This practice is becoming more common, particularly since the move towards video conferencing. Adding audio to an e‐poster can be more efficient in terms of knowledge transfer than reading the equivalent amount of text 10 . In Figure 2, an example of a modern poster format is presented.…”

“…This is a very useful tool, which could lead to an increase in full‐text clicks, downloads, and possibly citations. Hyperlinks can also be added to e‐posters, which allows the reader to access further information if they wish to do so 10 . QR codes and hyperlinks may also be used to direct the end user to interactive materials, quizzes and surveys.…”

“…As an example, Electronic‐posters (e‐posters) have been increasingly required in scientific conferences. This has become popular due to technological advancements, but also necessary due to the disruption to the “traditional” face‐to‐face conference as a result of the COVID‐19 pandemic 10 . There are many advantages to e‐posters when compared with traditional paper posters, including the environmental impact as e‐posters do not require printing 11 .…”