My Why Bother
Went to a symposium by the Centre of Cardiovascular Science (CCVS) last week, and made a brand new poster of our work to show people. This is really a PR mission to put our lab on the map. We are technically part of the CCVS but largely unknown. I was never hopeful that our poster is going to generate much interest from the other members of the centre and I was right. A glance at the list of posters on show confirmed my scepticism – we were the only poster with electrophysiology work. Great it may seem because it’s “something different”, but no, it only meant that people there do not work on the electrophysiology of the cardiovascular system, and ergo would not be interested in electrophysiology work. So I spent the best part of a 2 hour “poster session” stood next to my poster, slowly fossilising. I had one scientist and one clinician come over to look at the poster. The clinician was largely not interested in the science (when are they ever). The scientist was more inquisitive, and was the one bright spot of the session. Nonetheless, having just 2 visitors to my poster, which I spent a long time trying to dial down the technical jargon, so it would appeal more to a “never-going-to-be-interested-in electrophysiology” audience, is just simply abysmal and I came away from the symposium with just one thought – “Why bother?”
