The XLVII National Congress of the Spanish Society of Intensive Care Nursing and Coronary Units (SEEIUC) brought together more than 450 nurses last June in the city of Seville. The congress had to be cancelled in 2020 and was held virtually in 2021, so in this edition we have returned to 100% attendance. It was held jointly with the LVII National Congress of the Spanish Society of Intensive Care Medicine and Coronary Units (SEMICYUC) and the XXXVI National Congress of the Spanish Society of Paediatric Intensive Care (SECIP). The theme chosen for the congress was “New time leadership”.
This opportunity to share headquarters with other scientific societies of intensive care allowed us all to enrich ourselves personally and professionally, learning, and giving us the opportunity to hold joint sessions and round tables with the three societies. We have the critically ill patient in common, approaching care and the concerns of professionals from different angles, but with the same focus on the patient and his or her family in order to provide increasingly better care.
The congress has been a total success and a sum of efforts and synergies on the part of the three societies that makes us stronger.
During the three days of the SEEIUC congress, joint sessions were also held with physiotherapists, professionals who are so necessary in Intensive Care Units (ICU), as well as dealing with other essential issues such as the need to have a regulated and approved speciality in intensive care nursing to train nurses working in ICUs. The congress went in depth and advanced in different research and cutting-edge topics, as was reflected in the programme and in the more than 300 papers that we were able to see and hear in the form of oral communications and posters.
The congress was inaugurated by the civil authorities of the city of Seville, the presidents of the professional associations and the presidents of the three societies to welcome all the attendees, and began with a lecture by Dr. Manuel Herrera Carranza.
This year the congress was attended by national experts who participated in the joint SEEIUC-SEMICYUC sessions on learning from the pandemic from an ethical point of view, the urgent and necessary speciality of intensive care nursing, and the post-pandemic syndrome after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Seven round tables specific to intensive care nursing were held, all of which were very well received given the interest of the subject matter and the quality of the speakers. One of them particularly stood out for its novel and more participative format, on a healthy working environment.
The round tables shared with other professionals were also very well attended, with a specific table for physiotherapists and two others shared with physiotherapists and paediatric critical care nurses. In addition, we had three symposia carried out by the industry on the forefront of extrarenal depuration therapies, perfusion in critical patients and the update on infection prevention. There was also a thematic session on cough support for aspiration of respiratory secretions.
Eleven workshops with different topics were held, some of them split into two or three editions due to the interest of the participants. The themes of the workshops were communication, bioethics, renal replacement therapies, extracorporeal cardiac ECMO, ultrasound-guided venous puncture, hygiene and infection prevention in the ICU, mobilisation of the critical patient and simulation.
The balance of this first face-to-face congress after the pandemic, where we were all eager to meet and get together again, has been very positive. A congress is much more than a scientific exchange, it is the reunion of colleagues, professionals, friends and acquaintances, opportunities for new ways of collaborating, networking, devising new projects, learning about other ways of working and facing the difficulties encountered in the day-to-day care of patients and their families, as well as bringing us up to date. It is an enrichment and growth as people and professionals resulting from the involvement of everyone: members, congress participants, industry, SEEIUC working groups, technical secretariats and different people who make these professional meetings possible every year. For all these reasons, my sincere gratitude to all of you who have made this XLVII National Congress of the Spanish Society of Intensive Care Nursing and Coronary Units possible, and I apologise for any shortcomings it may have had. I would also like to thank you for all the suggestions you have made to us for improvement in order to move forward and improve future congresses, as well as in society as a whole.
I would like to take this opportunity to tell you that the next congress, as announced in Seville, will be held in Malaga from 4 to 7 June 2023 with the theme “Reinventing the future” and that the SEEIUC Board of Directors and Scientific Committee and the Working Groups are already working and preparing it with great enthusiasm. We are open and eager to receive your contributions and suggestions in order to prepare a quality scientific programme tailored to your needs.
At the closing ceremony we awarded 5 prizes, 3 for the best oral communications, one for the best article published in Enfermería Intensiva, a journal which, thanks to the work of its editors and reviewers, is increasingly better positioned in terms of article quality and citations, and the other prize went to the “Investiga SEEIUC” Grant, which promotes and favours nursing research, so necessary for our profession to continue to advance and grow.
Finally, I would like to encourage you all to continue strengthening ties and collaborations among all of us to contribute and to be able to give our patients and families the care they deserve.
My great thanks to all of you for the professional work you have always shown and especially for these two long years, a period in which we nurses in intensive care and coronary units have faced new challenges and commitments that we have been overcoming, adapting to new realities.
The response that we professionals working in intensive care units have given to the serious health crisis, with professionalism, teamwork, commitment, social responsibility and humanity, has highlighted the true meaning of our profession as nurses, which is to care for patients and their families at any time and in any situation, despite the limited resources to which we have been subjected, and the endless working hours.
I am sure that after what we have shared in this XLVII SEEIUC Congress, we have all come out stronger as health professionals and proud to be nurses.
All this has led to a better understanding by society and our leaders of our nursing profession and the intensive care area, with the competencies required to work in it. As a result, we have progressed towards the recognition of the need for a speciality of intensive care nursing to guarantee the comprehensive care of all critically ill patients and their families.
Thank you all very much and we hope to meet again in Malaga at the XLVIII National Congress of the Spanish Society of Intensive Care Nursing and Coronary Units (SEEIUC).
