Adjusting to the Reign of Webinars: Viewpoint

Abstract

Background With the integration of COVID-19 into our lives, the way events are organized has changed. The Cerrahpaşa Neuroscience Days held on May 8-9, 2021, was one of the conferences that was affected. The annual conference of the student-based Cerrahpaşa Neuroscience Society transitioned to the internet for the first time and had the premise of going international. Objective With this study, we aim to both discuss how a virtual conference is organized and perceived, and where our conference stands within the literature as a completely student-organized event. Methods The conference was planned in accordance with virtual standards and promoted to primarily medical schools. During the execution, there were no major issues. The feedback was collected via a form developed with Google Forms. Results Out of 2195 registrations, 299 qualified to receive a certificate. The feedback forms revealed a general satisfaction; the overall quality of the event was rated an average of 4.6 out of 5, and the ratings of various Likert scale–based questions were statistically analyzed. Open-ended questions provided improvement suggestions for future events. Conclusions The virtual Cerrahpaşa Neuroscience Days was a success in organization and received positive feedback from the participants. We aim to ground future events on this experience.