Record 7,000 health-care workers to attend innovation convention

Wallis Wang

More than 7,000 health-care professionals will attend the Hospital Authority Convention at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre next Thursday and Friday to exchange views on medical innovation.

This marks the highest number of participants of the event.

Over 160 experts from overseas, the mainland, and local institutions will present at 58 sessionsof the convention, discussing various topics including smart hospital development, the application of artificial intelligence, mental health, as well as organ transplants, according to the convention's scientific program committee head Loletta So Kit-ying.

She saidthe convention's primary goal is to facilitate the sharing of knowledge and experience in clinical advancements and promote modern healthcare service models.

To facilitate this, 17 medical study courses will be available for health-care professionals to discuss the latest developments in the Hospital Authority's medical services.These courses will cover areas such as neurological development, preoperative nursing and cancer treatment.

One of the highlights of the convention will be the presentation of the Hong Kong East Cluster's hybrid operating room, which was constructed in 2022.

Samuel Lam Siu-kei, a neurosurgery consultant at Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital, described the room as a one-stop facility for diagnosis and treatment, aiming to improve surgical accuracy, patient safety and reduce hospitalization time.

Equipped with a new robotic angiographic system and a high-quality computed tomography system, the operation room enables doctors to perform complex and urgent interventional radiotherapy surgeries,he said.

As a result, the hospital's efficacy has improved significantly, with the number of minimally invasive brain surgeries increasing to 150 last year from 120 in 2022,Lam added.

The hybrid mode can allow patients with brain bleeding to be discharged sooner by reducing the recurrence risk, he said.

"We can also prescribe medicines that help prevent blood clots sooner to reduce the risk of stroke and heart attack in the future. Generally speaking, patients' hospitalization time can be reduced to two to three days, much quicker compared to the seven to 14-day hospitalization time in the past," he added.