The first time you walk into a Don’t Forget The Bubbles conference, something unexpected happens.
You realise you are not the only one.
Not the only person who worries about getting the diagnosis right at three in the morning. Not the only one who still replays difficult conversations with families long after the shift ends. Not the only one who believes that the care of children deserves a little more thought, a little more curiosity, a little more kindness than the system sometimes allows.
Suddenly, you’re in a room filled with people who feel exactly the same way.
And that changes things.
Over the years, our conferences have become places where those people find each other. Where clinicians, nurses, educators and trainees gather not just to listen to talks, but to share ideas, test assumptions and remind themselves why they chose to do this work in the first place.
If you’ve been to one before, you’ll recognise the feeling.
The room fills slowly as the first session approaches. The buzz of conversations in the hallway between talks. The sense that something interesting might happen at any moment because the people in the room are curious, generous and just a little bit mischievous.
What makes a conference memorable isn’t usually the slide deck.
It’s the moments.
The time a speaker says something that suddenly reframes the way you think about a problem you see every day. A question from the audience sparks a discussion that no one expected. The conversations that start between sessions and somehow continue over dinner hours later.
Over the years, we’ve been lucky enough to share many of those moments.
Even now, people still stop me at work to talk about sessions they remember years later. One that comes up again and again is Rachel Callendar’s talk at DFTB17. Rachel spoke about the life and death of her daughter Evie, and the photography project that followed – capturing portraits of children living with syndromes, differences and life-limiting illness.
It was a reminder that the words we choose, and the way we show up in those moments, matter more than we sometimes realise. In paediatrics, every conversation carries weight.
There have been extraordinary speakers from across paediatrics and emergency medicine, educators who have challenged the way we teach, clinicians who have changed the way we approach common problems, and storytellers who have reminded us that medicine is ultimately about people.
Sometimes the most memorable moments come from unexpected places.
In Brisbane, Joe Brumm – the creator of Bluey – joined us on stage to talk about storytelling, childhood, and the quiet moments that shape both. In another session, Jo Tully, Bindu Bali, and Tim Druce helped us explore the complicated realities behind making a child protection notification.
At another conference, Craig McBride distilled the idea of improvement down to a beautifully simple truth:
It starts with one.
One conversation.
One idea taken back to your department.
One person deciding to try something differently.
But the best moments at DFTB conferences are rarely the ones we plan.
They are the ones that happen in the spaces between the sessions.
When someone realises that the person they’ve been reading about online for years is standing beside them at the coffee stand.
There’s a pause.
Then someone says,
“Wait… are you…?”
And the conversation begins.
Science AND Stories
This year, we’re leaning even further into the idea that medicine is a human story.
On the evening before the conference begins, we’ll host a special storytelling event inspired by The Moth.
A handful of clinicians will step onto the stage with no slides, no data and no safety net – just a story from their lives in medicine.
The moments that changed them.
The patients they still think about.
The unexpected lessons that come from working with children and families.
Medicine is full of stories like these. We just don’t always create the space to share them.
This evening is our way of making that space.
DFTB26 — Back to Basics
When the conference begins the next morning, the focus shifts back to the questions that bring us together in the first place.
How do we recognise the seriously ill child earlier?
How do we communicate uncertainty with families?
How do we support each other in doing difficult work well?
The program for DFTB26 in Glasgow is taking shape and will feature clinicians, educators and thinkers from across paediatrics and emergency medicine. Alongside the DFTB crew, we’ll also be welcoming many of our FOAMed friends — including colleagues from St Emlyn’s, The Skeptics’ Guide to Emergency Medicine, Paediatric Emergencies, and for those whose hearts lie in the PICU, the team behind PICSTAR.
Some sessions will be deeply practical.
Some will challenge the way we think about medicine and education.
All of them are designed with one goal in mind: helping you become a little better at the work you do every day.
You can explore the developing program here:
www.dftb26.com
Why Glasgow?
Every DFTB conference takes on a little of the character of the city that hosts it.
Glasgow feels like the perfect place for the next chapter of the DFTB story.
It’s a city known for its warmth, humour and creativity – the sort of place where conversations with strangers quickly become conversations with friends.
And if past conferences have taught us anything, it’s that some of the best moments happen after the talks are finished, when people wander out into the evening, find somewhere to eat, and keep talking about the ideas that sparked during the day.
Glasgow feels like a city made for those conversations.
Every DFTB conference begins the same way.
A room fills slowly with people who care deeply about the care of children. Some familiar faces. Many new ones. Somewhere near the coffee stand, someone looks a little closer and says,
“Wait… are you…?”
And the conversation begins.
If that sounds like the sort of room you’d like to be in, we’d love to see you in Glasgow.
