It was a great success with over 60 attendees coming from across Switzerland (and internationally), representing different disciplines and domains within perinatal mental health coming together to share knowledge and network.
International experts Prof. Susan Ayres, Prof. Fiona Alderdice and Prof. Julie Jomeen gave keynote talks throughout the day. Furthermore, presentations were given on a broad range of topics from midwifery, and family health to psychoendocrinology and engineering and radiology attending researchers and clinicians. Over 16 posters were also presented on these broad topics. Early career researchers were well represented having their own section for oral presentations and being well presented in the poster presentations. The small nature of the event and friendly atmosphere made this a great event for our early career researchers to exercise their persentation and networking skills. Social media posts using the hashtag #SwissPerinatal from attendees throughout the day were widely shared and caught international attention, providing yet another platform for show casing the current work on perinatal mental health here in Switzerland. Our attendees reported particularly enjoying the quantity and breadth of work presented via posters and oral presentations, discovering new topics and perspectives within perinatal mental health and the opportunity to listen to the keynotes of our international speakers. The feedback indicates there is real enthusiasm to continue to meet as a network of researchers through future events. We hope this will be the first of many stimulating, inspiring events of the Swiss Perinatal Research Network. The next steps to formalize the Network is to establish a steering committee, and we hope to organize one more workshop before the annual conference next year.
Feedback quotes:
“The event was well prepared and organised ! Presentation times were well respected and this allowed the smooth running of the day with comfortable breaks. I really enjoyed being able to get in touch with people in the field of perinatal research.”
“Great day. Excellent keynote speakers. Stimulating to see so many researchers interested in perinatality. Rythm of presentation very stimulating and really welldone for having respected your timing.”
“The presentations were very good and interesting. They have given me a better idea of the overall management of perinatal care.”
“It was a very successful event, loads of information, exchanges, posters. The topics weren't limited to mental health, it was a benefit for the audiences from other fields, such as midwives and nurses work at maternity units.”