The 25th anniversary LBG Medical Biomechanics Summer School marked an important moment in the field of clinical biomechanics for me. My first attendance at this conference was as a new-graduate delegate in 1996 and the narrative was one of exploration, instruction in clinical techniques and emerging science in the field – although we were just getting to grips with evidence ‘based’ medicine in those days and Medline was still on CD-ROM!
The conference was unlike anything I had ever experienced – podiatry wasn’t just great, it was trailblazing! Rx Laboratories Biomechanics Summer School (as it was then), meant that I couldn’t take my eyes off a career in clinical biomechanics and musculoskeletal podiatry and here we are two decades later and I still feel exactly the same.
While in 2019 we are having the same conversation, it is now on a different level. Evidence ‘informed’ practice is embedded in our professional DNA, technology has afforded us an insight into the real mechanics under the bonnet of human locomotion, and we are embracing the future with the same hunger as we did in the 1990s.
The lesson we learn from the Biomechanics Summer School (as we affectionately call it), is that you thought you knew the foot then you realise you weren’t even asking the right questions.
The interactive nature of the Biomechanics Summer School ensures we have the opportunity to and inspiration to ask the right questions. We are challenged with cutting-edge science and narratives in lectures, and we get to see the best in the industry opening debate on the understanding and application of key concepts that underpin effective clinical practice.
Every time I go to the BiomechanicsSummer School I come away with a new perspective, new friends and contacts and wonderful memories of ‘the one where…happened’. If you are thinking about CPD for 2020, look no further.