key: cord-0943389-4iwm1yf8 authors: Kramer, Holly; Joseph, Jessica; Rosner, Mitchell H.; Perazella, Mark A. title: In Case of a Pandemic, Pivot: Moving the National Kidney Foundation Spring Clinical Meetings Online date: 2020-09-23 journal: Am J Kidney Dis DOI: 10.1053/j.ajkd.2020.09.004 sha: 6a82c316310d97f549c5981ac42e9b7719459d30 doc_id: 943389 cord_uid: 4iwm1yf8 nan During the first week of March, the United States found itself facing the worst pandemic in over one hundred years due to the spread of a novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the causative agent of corona virus disease 2019 . The total number of COVID-19 cases was overall low in the United States during the first week of March, but the vulnerability of patients treated with kidney replacement therapy to poor outcomes with COVID-19 1 was becoming more apparent A growing number of cases of COVID-19 began to emerge in dialysis units in Seattle, New York, Chicago, and Detroit. The first known US death due to COVID-19, at that time, was a patient receiving maintenance hemodialysis at the Northwest Kidney Center in the State of Washington. In addition, the epidemiology of spread of the SARS-CoV-2 now included the risk of asymptomatic spread between individuals. 2 The National Kidney Foundation (NKF) was in its last few weeks of preparation for the annual Spring Clinical Meetings (SCM) to be held in New Orleans, Louisiana. Over 3000 people had registered for the meeting and more than 300 faculty members were scheduled to provide educational content. During this time period, employers began implementing travel bans, which prohibited a growing number of faculty members from attending the SCM. Several scientific meetings to be held around the same time as the NKF SCM were being cancelled. Implementing the NKF SCM as a face-to-face meeting looked less and less possible. The NKF faced a choice of either cancelling the meeting, or making a dramatic pivot and moving the NKF 2020 SCM completely online. Pivoting to something new is never easy. First, success is never guaranteed and when breaking new ground there is no opportunity to learn from the mistakes of others. Second, the lack of certainty that innovations will be accepted can be unnerving. There is no guarantee that J o u r n a l P r e -p r o o f stakeholders will approve of subtle changes, let alone dramatic ones, and forging ahead risks losing the confidence of the audience. Third, the financial implications cannot be reliably estimated because there is no precedent nor any way to ensure success. In such times of largescale ambiguity, leaders must rely on their mission statement or organizational purpose to help them steer the ship in uncertain waters. When it is unclear what an organization should do, the question should pivot to "What is the right thing to do?" The mission of the NKF is dedicated to preventing kidney and urinary tract diseases, and improving the health and well-being of individuals and families affected by kidney disease. Educating professionals on the most recent research, and advances in clinical care for patients with all stages of kidney disease remains one of the most important tasks for the NKF. Every spring, the NKF provides one of the largest multidisciplinary educational meetings for all clinicians who treat patients with kidney disease. These educational offerings help to maintain the highest standards of practice for professionals treating patients with kidney disease and help them obtain needed continuing educational credits to maintain their licenses. The NKF SCM offers learning tracks for nephrologists, dialysis nurses and technicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, social workers, transplant coordinators, and renal dietitians and is the one of the very few meetings to offer inter-professional educational opportunities for credit. Hundreds of new and established investigators also present research in poster presentations. The NKF SCM also provides a forum for young investigators to showcase research funded by the NKF and for fellows, residents, and medical students to present interesting cases and research projects on kidney disease. During this meeting, professionals can also interact with industry and nonprofit sponsors to learn about the latest products and services in order to J o u r n a l P r e -p r o o f advance kidney disease care. Lastly, the NKF recognizes nephrology leaders for their contributions to research, teaching and advocacy over the past year. These awards help the nephrology community celebrate its leaders and their accomplishments. Porting all of the educational content, poster presentations, and awards to an online platform seemed impossible. Many other organizations with scheduled in-person conferences during March decided not to move a conference completely online. NKF, with its long history of taking risk, simply decided that a pandemic couldn't halt its mission; it could only force NKF to pivot. The NKF staff began working on making the SCM completely virtual in March but the change to an online format was not announced until March 10 because staff needed to ensure the feasibility of a completely virtual conference. Details of the virtual SCM planning have been previously discussed. 3 Once the decision was made to go virtual, NKF staff first notified the SCM20 Program Committee and then faculty despite multiple logistical unknowns in the planning. Zoom webinars were utilized for the conference because staff was familiar with the technology. NKF staff set up a call with the Zoom account representatives to discuss options and ensure that 16 concurrent sessions could be held simultaneously over the course of a week. Multiple Zoom webinar licenses were then obtained and all participating faculty were individually contacted and trained on Zoom technology. Each SCM session was assigned a Zoom account and speakers were provided with a unique panelist link to access the Zoom webinars via email calendar invite. This Zoom link would bring speakers and panelists into a practice session similar to a "backstage" where they could prepare and converse with NKF staff, the session chair, and other speakers. Attendees were notified of the pivot to a virtual SCM through a series of email announcements, social media, and NKF's website. Buttons to access and register for each Zoom webinar were placed on the program schedule on the SCM website, as well within the SCM20 mobile app. Once a session ended, the link/button was replaced with an updated "on-demand" link to access the recorded session. All attendees had to register their name and email address for every session (live and recorded). At the end of each day, attendee reports were downloaded and compared to the SCM20 registration report. Those individuals who registered and paid for the conference were granted CME/CE credit. Abstracts and posters were presented through an eposter platform that had been utilized for past meetings. Attendees could view these e-posters through the SCM20 mobile app or through NKF's website. NKF encouraged attendees to view In summary, NKF's virtual SCM served as an early demonstration that large-scale virtual medical conferences can be successful. Participation in virtual conferences can exceed participation in conventional conferences and overall satisfaction. Virtual conferences lack multiple social aspects of in person meetings. However, the heightened access for attendees who could not travel for in-person meetings exemplifies the efficiency and equity of virtual conferences and may balance these social setbacks. We thank the NKF staff, Program Committee, and entire faculty for their courage in helping NKF successfully conduct its very first virtual SCM. Support: None. Financial Disclosure: Ms Joseph employed by NKF as Senior Vice President for Scientific Operations. Other Disclosures: Dr Kramer is the current President of the NKF; she also serves as AJKD Engagement Editor but was entirely recused from the manuscript consideration process. Drs Perazella and Rosner were the Chair and Co-Chair, respectively, of the NKF SCM20. Hemodialysis and COVID-19: An Achilles' heel in the pandemic health care response in the United States Presumed Asymptomatic Carrier Transmission of COVID-19 JAMA Transitioning a Live Annual Conference into a Virtual Meeting During a Pandemic: Lessons Learned Peer Review: Received June 16, 2020 in response to an invitation from the journal. Evaluated by 2 external peer reviewers, with direct editorial input from an Associate Editor and a Deputy Editor. Accepted in revised form September 11, 2020.