Kelsey Nation's Conference Summary

    Kelsey Nation
     Ph.D. Student
     Neuroscience GIDP

     Conference Summary
     International Headache Congress
     Vancouver, Canada

Thanks to funding from the Carter Travel Award I was able to attend the 18th International Headache Congress in Vancouver, Canada. This conference was focused on both the basic science and the clinical aspects of headache disorders. Hearing about both basic science and clinical findings was very useful. As a preclinical researcher it was great to hear about other directions in preclinical work and how my own findings fit in with other findings in the field. Hearing about other preclinical findings gives me new ideas to incorporate into my own research.  I particularly liked hearing the clinical presentations by practicing clinicians because they shared information about what patients with headache disorders are experiencing and this kind of information is sometimes hard to get access to as a preclinical researcher, but I think that it is very important as a basic researcher to understand the clinical presentation of headache disorders and the issues that clinicians face in treating  these disorders, as well as the concerns that they hear from their patients. I was able to attend lectures from experts in the field and industry-sponsored talks. I learned more about the current status of drugs in development for migraine. For the first time in about twenty years there are several drugs in stage 3 clinical trials that are developed specifically for the treatment of migraine. These drugs belong to a new class of drugs, called CGRP antibodies, and I learned specific details about each of these drugs, which will likely be important in the near future because the clinical data is very promising so far and it seems likely that this class of medications will soon be used for the treatment of migraine. This was a very exciting meeting because of the recent developments in migraine treatment with these new medications doing well in clinical trials, and it seems like these drugs may be the first medications specifically designed for preventative treatment of migraine to get FDA approval. I also learned that another class of drugs, called CGRP antagonists have re-entered clinical trials for preventative and acute treatment of migraine.

I presented a poster on my research and I also gave a five-minute presentation. I appreciated the opportunity to share my work with others in the field. I liked meeting people at my poster and seeing the interest that others had in my research and being able to answer questions and discuss how my research might relate to other work. I also enjoyed visiting other people’s posters and discussing their projects with them. I met with a group whose MRI results from migraine patients might support the results that I am seeing with the rodent models that I am using. It is very exciting to see evidence of the translational potential of my research.

My abstract was ranked in the top 20% of accepted abstracts so I got to give a five-minute presentation in addition to having a poster at the conference. It was great to get the experience of giving a talk to a group of people that are unfamiliar with my work. Most presentations that I give are to my lab or to my department and this was an opportunity to gain the experience of giving a talk to a different group of people and in a different setting. Giving this talk drew a few more people to my poster for more in-depth discussions of my research.