Spring over to Belfast for our BGS meeting, sure it’ll be great craic!

10 March 2025

Dr Elaine Nelson is a Consultant Geriatrician in the Southern Health and Social Care Trust. In her consultant role, she rotates between Acute Frailty and the Community Hospital at Home Team. She is an Honorary Tutor in Queen’s University Belfast (QUB) and a lead for the QUB 4^th year Undergraduates during their Ageing & Health attachment in Craigavon Hospital. She is also the Training Programme Director for Geriatric Medicine in Northern Ireland. She posts on X, Bluesky and Instagram.

We look forward to welcoming you all to the BGS Spring Meeting in Belfast in April. This is a fantastic way to stay up to date and a chance to reconnect with friends whether that’s from university days or previous jobs. From my own experience, it’s lovely to see old faces and reminisce. Then there’s the opportunity to network and make new connections who share similar interests and inspire us with their ideas.

I am presenting on Friday 11 April at our Education and Training session. I will be sharing the platform with Dr James Irvine, one of our Geriatric Medicine trainees and Dr William McKeown who has recently started his consultant career. We have all completed our Masters in Clinical Education at Queens University Belfast. James will be presenting on the development of clinical education in Geriatric Medicine and William on the development of medical curricula. William is no stranger to the BGS, having helped to develop the Frailty elearning course. I look forward to both their presentations.

My presentation will be on the evaluation of an Ageing and Frailty Simulation with the use of ageing suits and equipment.

I am currently developing my role as Ageing Simulation Lead within the Southern Trust. My interests are in Interprofessional Education at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels whilst progressing Ageing and Frailty Simulation and developing a Dementia Simulation. James and I have facilitated interprofessional and interspecialty simulation for Higher Specialty trainees in Geriatric Medicine and General Internal Medicine around challenging communication and human factors. We hope to see you at our session on Friday 11 April at 14:30 in Stream 2.

Aside from the conference of course, you get the opportunity to stay in beautiful Belfast, voted one of the top ten friendliest cities in the UK. Why not take the weekend and explore Northern Ireland? There is so much to see and do.

Titanic Belfast is a must-see: this is the world’s largest Titanic visitor experience and was named the World’s Leading Tourist Attraction at the World Travel Awards in 2016. You can also tour the world’s largest dry dock where Titanic was built and take a dander along the Maritime Mile. You won’t be able to miss the famous yellow Harland and Wolff cranes called Samson and Goliath.

Or if you’re a ‘Game of Thrones’ fan, come and explore the Seven Kingdoms. There’s a studio tour and the beautiful Glass of Thrones as you walk the Maritime Mile. If you can venture further afield, there are many filming locations including the atmospheric Dark Hedges…

If you love the outdoors, then take a walk along our stunning Causeway Coast and Glens, an area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and home to Northern Ireland’s only UNESCO World Heritage Site, the legendary Giant’s Causeway. Having walked this recently, I’d say it certainly blew away the cobwebs!

There’s also fabulous food and drink to be had here. Firstly, we say everything is “wee”. We don’t mean it’s small; just accept that you’re not going to leave anywhere without having a “wee” cup of tea. The venue of the Waterfront Hall is just beside our award-winning St. George’s Market, one of Belfast’s oldest attractions which was named the UK’s Best Large Indoor Market 2023. This is on Friday, Saturday and Sunday with food, crafts and antiques. Relax over coffee and listen to live music from local musicians while sampling all the delicious food including the “belly busting” Belfast Bap.

The other must-eat is the traditional farmer’s breakfast: the Ulster Fry. We love bread…soda bread, potato bread and wheaten bread (a Speech and Language Therapist’s nightmare).

And of course, you will all know how much we love our potatoes. Irish Stew, Irish Boxty, Champ, Colcannon to name but a few. I’ll prepare you now that most cafés and restaurants will have a section dedicated to potatoes and all the different ways you can have them: chipped, boiled, mashed, baked, roasted, usually with at least two different types on the plate and not forgetting the ‘Potato of the Day’. Then there’s a chip butty, Tayto cheese and onion sandwich (both must be on white bread) …the list goes on.

All you need to do around this is fit in some shopping in Victoria Square and Queen’s Arcade, visit the Ulster Museum and Botanic Gardens and step back in time in the National Trust owned Crown Liquor Saloon for a pint of the black stuff. Check out this website for everything you need to know: https://visitbelfast.com/.

So, let’s look forward to an amazing conference and time well spent around Belfast. Oh, aye and keep ‘er lit!

Register to attend the BGS Spring Meeting 2025 to see Elaine's talk at 14:30 in Stream 2 on Friday 11 April.

2025 Spring Meeting

The BGS Spring Meeting took place in Belfast on 9-11 April. On demand registration is available, including CPD certification.