Dr Rogier Steins / General Practitioner / Netherlands
As a matter of tradition, everybody with an adventurous mind has been looking forward to this weekend since the beginning of the year. The World Extreme Medicine (WEM) conference is a three-day conference where medical professionals from diverse backgrounds explore the practice of medicine in challenging and resource-limited environments. Hosted annually at Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh, the conference offers a unique blend of hands-on experience and cutting-edge education across multiple streams, including expedition and wilderness medicine, humanitarian and disaster medicine, and more.
The World Extreme Medicine Conference stands out as a unique medical event. Its dynamic program, featuring workshops, keynote speeches and panel discussions, keeps you informed on the latest research in the field. What truly sets it apart, however, is the welcoming, informal atmosphere and the ease of connecting with others. It’s not just any crowd, you’ll find some of the most fascinating and adventurous individuals from around the world gathered here.
Whether you’re completely new to the concept of ‘extreme medicine’ or a seasoned expedition medic, there is something to boost everyone’s knowledge here. It was emphasised to become self-reliant and dependable in your desired environment. You need the physical and mental stamina to be reliable and have the capacity at the end of the day to look after your team. Firstly consider yourself a ‘rescue personnel’, and the medic as a bonus. Particularly for those hoping to enter into this world, it will make you desirable to employers. Being a generalist and simply being a nice person might seem like stating the obvious, but is easy to forget! After all, who would want to spend weeks on a mountain or aboard a ship with someone they don’t enjoy being around?
As has been the case for many years now, some of the Adventure Medic team were in attendance over the weekend. Thank you to all who came to say hello to us on our stand and around the venue. What an inspiration to meet so many different types of people with the same passion. We spoke to doctors, nurses, medical students, paramedics, first responders, scientists, astronauts, psychologists, journalists and many more. Not only did we get a chance to hear the stories of their latest expeditions and adventures, but some of them also agreed to write an article for our website in the future. When we weren’t manning the stand, we thoroughly enjoyed immersing ourselves in the conference. With so many excellent presentations, it’s difficult to pick just a few highlights from the conference – but we’ve given it a go!.
Conference highlights
The Big Debate: What are YOU Worth as an Expedition Medic? At the moment, there is no standard for expedition medical pay. There is a concern about the potential exploitation of medics who are eager to gain experience and grateful for the opportunity to get a foothold in the field. Although guiding standards, professionalization and pay have increased in the past decade, medic pay has lagged far behind. If you want to dive deeper into this topic, check out this recently published first part of our Masterclass series on Pay in the Expedition Medicine Community.
Shawna Pandya is an inspirational Canadian physician, who became Canada’s first named female commercial astronaut and is scheduled to fly with Virgin Galactic to advance space-based biomedical and physiological research. She shared her journey as a doctor and astronaut, and the 10 key lessons from operational environments she learned in the process. For example, during underwater spacewalk training, being suspended upside down underwater, with a leaking facemask, juggling a task and communicating with colleagues taught her how to be comfortably uncomfortable.
IED (Improvised Explosive Devices) was a scenario-based training where participants were divided into two groups. One group, acted as the field’s first responders. Armed with medical kits, they focused on addressing the most life-threatening conditions first. The chaos of the screaming sounds of the casualties and blaring sirens from the speakers and thick smoke heightened everyone’s adrenaline and added to the realism of the scenario. After performing critical life-saving measures, such as applying tourniquets, the team collaborated to transport the injured to medical tents, where the other group took over care as a field hospital of sorts. This was followed by a debrief and a discussion, with some excellent feedback and lessons learned.
The WEM Ceilidh is optional when booking the conference, but highly recommended. It is a traditional Scottish social gathering that features lively folk music and a lot of dancing. Don’t worry if you think you can’t dance, a “caller” guides participants through the steps. It’s always very enjoyable, and much more fun when everyone gets stuck in.
Get Involved
If you came up and spoke to us at our stand and would like to get involved, please contact us at contact@theadventuremedic.com.
If you want to get involved in expedition and wilderness medicine or humanitarian and disaster medicine this is your next best step. The WEM conference gives you the chance to connect with hundreds of ambitious like-minded medics and ignite ideas for your next expedition!
Don’t want to miss out on next year’s opportunity to attend the conference in person? The WEM conference will be in Edinburgh once again from the 15th-17th of November 2025. Secure your tickets here.
