I am very grateful I was able to attend this year’s BTS Winter Meeting thanks to the travel bursary I was awarded by the BALR! This was my first time at the BTS Winter meeting and my first oral presentation at a conference, so it has been a very exciting and valuable experience for me. A particular highlight of the Winter Meeting was the BTS/BLF/BALR Early Career Investigator Symposium, to which I was selected as a finalist to give a presentation. It was a great context to be giving my first conference presentation and I got lots of valuable feedback and new ideas through the discussion. At the end of the day, I was awarded Early
Career Investigator of the Year by the BALR – what an unexpected extremely good ending to the day! I am super grateful for the support of the BALR and for this Award and am highly motivated to continue my research!
As a final year PhD student and currently writing up my thesis, is has been invaluable to present my work to leaders in the field of respiratory research and to discuss potential collaborations and postdoc projects. Overall, it was a great conference in the heart of London and I will be sure to return!
Patricia Ogger - PhD Student, Imperial College London