The ANZ Society for Geriatric Medicine’s annual conference in Perth was attended by over 300 delegates – specialist geriatricians, registrars and allied health people – with over 60 delegates from Western Australia, home to about 40 geriatricians and 12 trainees. Convenor Dr Sean Maher was ably assisted by his organising committee (Drs Chris Beer, David Bruce, Mandy Boudville, Richard Cordell, Mark Donaldson, Leon Flicker, Charles Inderjeeth and Katherine Ingram) and the conference theme “Of Bones, Jointes and Sinewes”? pointed to a musculoskeletal theme.

In remote Aboriginal communities, the rates of kidney disease are 30 times higher than in Australia's major cities, which makes the prevention and treatment of kidney disease a major challenge. In response, Amgen Australia has recently hosted a series of outreach meetings entitled ‘Keep Kidneys Healthy', held in Cairns, Nowra, Alice Springs, Port Hedland, Karratha and Rockhampton. These followed a successful inaugural meeting at Alice Springs in 2006, where well known indigenous Australian sports people and musicians played a part. That event's success spawned the national Keeping Kidneys Healthy program with its renal education sessions for health workers.

Doctors, nurses, researchers, project managers and invited keynote speakers made up the 450 or so conference delegates for the Australasian Sexual Health Conference at the Perth Convention Centre. Thanks to the hard working organising committee (see photo), delegates enjoyed a varied and interesting program. Speakers from WA were from a range of related disciplines and included Drs Yee Leung, Louise Farrell, Stan Wisniewski, Judy Cole, Bronwyn Stuckey, Mei-Ling Tay-Kearney, Ken Maguire and Elizabeth Phillips.

About 470 delegates from Australia and overseas congregated at the Perth Convention Centre recently to catch up with the latest on pain appraisal and management. Amongst the 200 or so doctors were anaesthetists, rehabilitation specialists, neurologists, researchers, and pain specialists, while the remaining delegates included physiotherapists, psychologists, occupational therapists, scientists, and practice nurses...

Over 700 radiographers, sonographers and radiation therapists attended 2007's national conference at Perth's Convention Centre. The conference was preceded by leadership workshops. Conjoint streams for radiation therapy and medical imaging featured varied topics arranged by an active organising committee...

Around 300 delegates from at least five continents attended the recent 2006 General Practice and Primary Health Care Research Conference in Perth. This fledgling sector of the research 'industry' showcased some excellent research papers in what was a very positive meeting.

Around 400 Nuclear Medicine delegates - physicians, registrars, technologists, scientists, physicists, radiopharmacists and nurses - enjoyed the conference theme "Mapping the Future" where functional and hybrid imaging were featured as the future of medical imaging.

This recent combined Annual Scientific Meeting at the Perth Convention Centre was attended by about 1000 doctors, nurses, exhibitors, educators and scientists from Australia and overseas.

The four-day national conference featured over 400 abstracts delivered on topics from stents to sex steroids, covering the investigation, management and aetiology of heart disease.

Over 300 delegates from around Australia and overseas were treated to a wide program that tackled the personal, political and social contexts of the treatment of drug addictions.