National Council 2009, Thistle Hotel Glasgow

New Era - New Opportunities

What's this all about?

This year I thought I'd do something a little different and try and give anybody interested a feel for just what is going on at National Council. I plan on posting a number of bulletins over the weekend, the one's on Saturday and Sunday morning might be a bit hazy, the evenings tend to stretch into the early hours. For some reason I never seem to get much sleep on these weekends there's always people to catch up with, people who owe me drinks, people I owe drinks and then there's lots of work to do too.

I've somehow managed to get myself roped into facilitating two workshops this year. I've helped out with the Internal Pouch workshops for the last couple of years so that's nothing new, but this year I was looking forward to attending one of the others, this year there is a single pouch workshop on Sunday which means I'm free to attend one the Saturday workshops. We were short on volunteers for one of the Communications workshops so I offered to 'help out'. Hopefully we'll get gather some useful information from it that will enable us to move the Journal and Website forward in keeping with this years theme New Era - New Opportunities

JM - Posted at 9:15pm 2nd April '09

We've arrived!

After the best part of 4 hours in the car and a couple wrong turnings we've arrived. My navigator forgot what ihis job was and we ran out of motorway before he told me that I needed to turn off :-( Already started catching up with some familiar faces, met up with the delegation from North Midlands IA in the lobby and once I've had a quick refreshing wash I'm going to pop downstairs to the bar where I'm sure I'll bump into a good few others (why do I think they'll be in the bar?). WoS IA have arranged a reception for us this evening and most of us are going along to that and then the Pouch Group and Young IA have joined forces with the WoS committee and are going out for a meal later.

JM - Posted at 13:55pm 3rd April '09

Disaster!

After having used the same hosting service for over four years I've just suffered the first outage and the York IA website is down. Typical, the first time we try to do something a little different with technology and it lets us down. I've got tech support on the case and hopefully it will be fixed shortly, if you're reading this then it is. Yay!

Well, it seems the weather has delayed most of the delegates. Fog had flights delayed from London and Birmingham and people are only just arriving now. I met up with Anne Demick and we had a quick chat about the Communications Workshop that we are hosting. We took the time to check out t he rooms we will be using for the workshops and these look fine and then as nobody else was around took the opportunity to make use of the hotel facilities and popped down to the pool for a swim and a sauna.

Brian, our local Group Secretary and my room mate for the weekend has managed to make us the talk of our floor. He had asked the maid to help him with something in the room, as they entered Brian realized I was there and no longer had the need of the maid. Without thinking he turned around and said "Oh. not to worry, my partner will sort it out", the knowing look I was given by the maid spoke volumes and eventually Brian realized what he had just implied. I'm sure we'll have some laughs about this over the weekend.

People are arriving now so I'm off back down to the lobby to catch up with a few before we head off out into the night.

JM - Posted at 16:55pm 3rd April '09

Friday Night

Thanks to the efforts of West of Scotland IA we were invited to a Civic Reception at the Glasgow City Chambers, a truly magnificent building. As drinks flowed freely it was an opportunity to catch up with old friends and make new ones. I had a long chat with Ronnie, a National Council first timer from West Riding IA and we swapped a few ideas.

After this about 15 of us headed off for a meal at a local restaurant, unfortunately we opted for the chicken in pepper sauce which seemed to have all the pepper in the world in it. Back at the hotel we headed for the bar and eventually managed to find somebody in our party who had the correct peice of paper that would allow us to buy drinks and we sat down with a couple of the delegates from IA Greater London West. I'd met Richard Bowden last year and Twm Davies at the Internal Pouch Information Day.

In the early hours we decided to call it a night, quite early in comparison to some others year, but that's how I find myself here typing this entry at this time in the morning.

JM - Posted at 2:25am 4th April '09

A full English, a swim and a sauna, a good way to start the day

Today's when the actual business of National Council starts and I'm involved in one the workshops this afternoon so I really want to have my senses with me. The pool doesn't open until 8.00am so I opted to go for breakfast first, a full English breakfast and a couple of mugs of tea provided removed any hunger pangs and sets me up nicely for the rest of the day.

I would normally not go for a swim on a full stomach but the late opening time of the pool meant I would probably have missed breakfast had I done things in the opposite order. A few lengths of the pool and a little time in the sauna got me quite refreshed for the day ahead.

At the time of writing, the website is still down so I'm going to keep further postings local to my laptop and will upload them once we are active again. This probably will not happen until Monday now.

JM - Posted at 9:00pm 4th April '09

The New Editor

I was wandering through reception when I heard familiar voice shout "John!", as I looked around I spotted Scott Clifford coming down the stairs. I've known Scott since we did the Visitors Course back in 2006 and he has just been announced as the Journal Editor as John Smail is standing down afer the Summer Edition, I'm sure IA have found a great replacement and Scott will do a great job. We are both involved in today's Communications Workshop where we are discussing the ways we can move forward with the IA website and the Journal. From the people I know who are attending I'm pretty sure there will be some good and active discussion

We went down to register, pick up our delegate packs and then went for a wander around the manufacturer displays. Every year each of them holds a free raffle with a variety of prizes ranging from iPods and DAB radios to Weekend breaks and M&S vouchers, I always feel a little guilty entering these as there is nothing they have that I use but we know many of them from our own meetings and Open Days we attend and I try to keep reasonably up to date with new products for when I'm visiting. Wandering through here always gives the opportunity to meet more old friends, especially those who only arrived on the Saturday morning.

Shortly the main business of the day will start.....

JM - Posted at 10:45pm 4th April '09

Start of Business

After the usual introductions, welcomes and apologies we were given a presentation on the theme of this years conference 'New Era - New Opportunities. Being somebody who loves technology I'm looking forward to IA exploring all the new ways we can deliver information to those with ileostomies and internal pouches. We've been using the internet for some time but there are many opportunities for us with this medium that we are missing, hopefully this afternoon's workshop will give us some more ideas for the future. There are a whole host of new ways that we can deliver information, the traditional paper, CD and DVD formats, digital documents and podcasts and it will be interesting to see which of these we start using.

We covered most of the Executive Committee reports in this period, all of these are in the event brochure - I've often wondered whether this should be made available as PDF on the website. There are a number of groups who do not attend NC for various reasons and there is lots of information in the brochure is often not easily accessible anywhere else.

JM - Posted at 13:45pm 4th April '09

The Bryan Brooke Lecture

After the important business of lunch was out of the way we were introduced to Mr. Ian Finlay who was presenting this years Bryan Brooke Lecture. When I first read about this years lecture I was intrigued, the Kock Pouch has largely been superceded by the Parks 'Pelvic Pouch' in recent years - however, it seems the Kock Pouch is making a comeback. Dr. Finlay gave us a brief history of the Kock Pouch and explained how it was formed.

The Kock Pouch is unusual in that the person still has an abdominal stoma but it is intended to be continent, this means the owner has no need to wear an appliance. Waste gathers in an internal pouch fashioned from the small bowel and when it is time to empty a catheter is used to 'open' the valve. The Kock Pouch can be an alternative to a Brooke ileostomy in patients where a Parks Pouch is not an option, perhaps due to damaged anal sphincters or it may be possible convert a failing Parks Pouch into a Kock pouch.

This operation has been performed a number of times in Scotland in recent years and the Radcliffe in Oxford has started performing them too (3 in the last 18 months). There are still a number of problems, normally problems with the valve and re-operation rate is higher than would be desired but in individuals who have a strong desire to avoid a permanent ileostomy it is once again becoming a viable option.

Mr. Finlay then introduced us to three young ladies who had all been through this procedure and along with the help of Prof. Neil Mortenson they answered a number of questions from the audience - well done to them for volunteering to go through that, it can't have been comfortable.

JM - Posted at 15:15pm 4th April '09

The Communications Wokshop

After the break the business meeting continued and the voting for the elected reps took place. I wigged out of this, Brian our voting delegate knew my preferences and I needed to prepare for the workshop. I wandered down to the room with David Demick to set up the projector and we were joined by Scott who was going to be doing a little bit on the Journal. I got myself set up and at the appropriate time the delegates arrived, we had about 30 and they were a good mix of people who were very savvy and others who had never seen the website.

I gave a brief history of the IA website and then we discussed how people might find us, I also gave a quick explanation of Google Adwords and how that scheme has benefited IA. I gave a quick tour of the site paying particular attention to the parts that are particularly pertinent to the local groups. After this the group split into smaller groups to discuss what they had seen and then we got together to discuss the ideas that had come up.

We got a stack of feedback that we can use to drive the future design of the website and how we can further make use of the internet to help promote IA and the work we do. We also found a number of young dynamic IT professionals who are really keen to get involved and help shape the future direction, hopefully we can leverage their experise and ideas in the near future.

As is always the case with these things we overran, this meant that we didn't have the chance to cover the Journal at all. Scott will handle this in tomorrow's workshop - I'm willing to bet now that what was scheduled for that workshop doesn't happen at all and the Journal takes up all the time.

JM - Posted at 18:45pm 4th April '09

Saturday Night

After the workshops were done I went out for a walk and some fresh air and then went back to the hotel room for a bit of a rest before getting glammed up for the evening. Saturday nights at these events don't really get going until after the meal and we often end up putting the world in order until the early hours, this year was no different but there was an unexpected turn of events that no one expected.

Lots of alcohol is consumed, there is lots of laughter and lots of friendships are made. This year, besides the regular live music and dancing we had a Blackjack and Roulette table and a handful of Monopoly money to keep us entertained. I'm not a lover of roulette but spent a good deal of time playing Blackjack and made a few new friends around the table - we had a common foe, we all wanted to beat the banker. Around midnight the games finished and we retired to the bar. As the bar around the dining room closed we started to make our way back to the main hotel bar and then the fire alarm went off, everybody looked at one another and waited the obligatory 5-10 seconds before deciding yes it's real and then we all made our way outside. 1.00am in Glasgow is not really the time you want to be standing in the street without a coat, most of blokes were fine in our dinner jackets but the ladies were freezing, jackets were swapped and the men pretended not to be cold while the ladies kept warm. After what seemed an age the fire brigade arrived and eventually we were given the go ahead to get back inside.

A healthy crowd made their way to the bar and most of the usual suspects were there and a host of new faces. The conversations ranged from things that had happened throughout the day to discovering what our 'porn star names' were (mine was clearly very much a 'B' movie name, sort of Celebrity Big Brother material). Eventually we gave up and made our way to bed at around 4.00am.

JM - Posted at 7:45pm 5th April '09

The Salts Healthcare Lecture

Despite the late night I somehow managed to rise at 7.15am, after a shower I was suitably refreshed and went down for breakfast. I joined Mary one of the delegates from York and another hearty feast set me up for the rest of the day. We gathered back in the meeting room for the Salts lecture, Alison Crawshaw a stoma care nurse who has experience of both the public and commercial sectors gave us a talk on the history of colorectal surgery and stomas and looked at the ways the provision of stoma care has changed over the years and how it is likely to change in the future.

After a break for tea and coffee and the drawing of the raffle prizes from the manufacturers (as usual I left empty handed :-() we got back to winding up the business of the AGM, this was the interesting part for those who were standing for election to the Executive Committee. As I was unopposed and nobody objected I was elected into the role of National Pouch Coordinator, just what I've let myself in for we'll discover over the next few months. Sue Blackwell took over as Young IA coordinator and Rachel Hayward, who was the previous Pouch Coordinator, was elected as one of the elected representatives.

Most of the business was wound up in this session and I ought to congratulate Prof. Neil Mortenson for his handling of the business meeting. Given this was his first time he handled things brilliantly, being firm when necessary and keeping things moving along without ever having to rush.

JM - Posted at 11:40pm 5th April '09

The Internal Pouch Workshop

Rachel's final task as Pouch Coordinator was to run the Pouch Workshop and I helped her facilitate this. We decided to host a session similar to one from the Pouch Information Day where we wanted to look at the delivery of information of to internal pouch patients in the key first 12 months or so. We had about 18 present and that included a number of stoma care nurses who were hoping to increase their knowledge, a number of people who are just looking at going through the process of pouch surgery, visitors who do not have a pouch looking for ways that they can help as well as a number of fully fledged pouchies.

The topic of the Pouch Information Day came up and everybody said that somebody from each group ought to attend the next one. We were also asked if we had any of the information that was disseminated on that day and we could send it to each group. The discussions, often like pouch surgery itself veered widely from what we had intended but everybody got involved and hopefully everybody got something from it.

It''s clear that everybody who attended was looking for ways in which we can improve the journey through that tricky first 12 months and we need to look at the ways we can help with that and I guess much of this will tie in with work we will have from the other workshops.

JM - Posted at 13:40pm 5th April '09

Rounding Up

Thanks to Prof. Mortenson's handling of the business we all met back in the main hall for a closing presentation and our vision for the future. There are many new opportunities that IA must grasp in the coming months, years to enable us to continue to help stoma and pouch patients get back to living their lives. Clearly aware that many people have a long way to go to get home the Prof. kept things short and wound things up before we went for lunch.

After an exellent lunch I took a walk around the room to say my goodbyes. Some of the people there I'll see many times in the next few weeks/months, others I won't see until National Council next year or maybe even longer. The thing that always amazes me is that when we do meet up how we just pick up where we left off.

Getting out of Glasgow was a pain, the slip road to the motorway was closed and we were redirected around the city, this took about 45 minutes and then when we finally hit the road some non-existent roadworks then delayed us further. Once past there we made good time and after dropping off Brian and Mary I finally arrived home in Wilberfoss at about 6.50pm. So that's that National Council is over for another year, we have a very busy year ahead of us before the next one but I know most of us leave there quite energized and full of ideas to back to our groups.

JM - Posted at 21:40pm 5th April '09

NC-2009. Final Thoughts

I always make sure I have the week following National Council off, it usually falls around Easter time anyway so I have some time to spend with the kids. Of course there are other reasons too, I'm lucky if I get more than 7 hours sleep over the weekend so a good rest is in order once I get home and I like to take a bit of time out just to mull over some of the things that have come up.

I always leave there with a whole slew of new ideas and ways to freshen up the things we already do. It also amazes me the number of people that ask how we manage to do some of the things that we take for granted, one delegate asked me how we managed to get the manufacturers reps to come to our meetings and was absolutely gobsmacked to find that not only do we get them to come along but we charge them for the privilege (we only charge enough to cover the cost of our room hire). I guess other delegates feel the same about some of the questions we ask them.

The feedback we've had back from the two workshops I was involved in has been really encouraging and I'm pretty sure the others were similar, there was hardly a moment went by when somebody wasn't accosting me about something to do with the workshops. Given the suggestions that came up I probably ought to start blogging or tweeting about some of the things we are up to in the Internal Pouch Subcommittee. I've got a whole list of things that have been suggested and many ideas of my own, it will be interesting to see just what we can achieve in the next year or so. It was great to see so many of the younger folk putting their hands up to get involved with things and the interest and receptiveness of the more mature members to many of the ideas presented and put forward surprised a lot of us.

This year I felt particularly energized, it was good to see such an active younger presence and the theme of the conference gave many of them reasons to get involved. Having taken over as Pouch Coordinator I expect this year to be a particularly busy one for me, just keeping up with the things we've done under Rachel's tenure is going to be hard enough and there are lots of other things I'd like to do. I'm looking forward to a rest for the next week or so, but no doubt then it'll be back to work and I'll start thinking about NC-2010.........

JM - Posted at 14:40pm 7th April '09