Conference & Meetings World Supplements Canada Supplement | Page 9

Québec
technologies.
“The secret ingredient of
Québec City’s Life Sciences and
healthcare technology industry
is thanks in great part to quality
research and innovation matched
with ambitious entrepreneurs who
can take that innovative research
and expertise - and make both
available to people around the
world to improve their daily lives,”
Viel concludes.
Key figures for Québec City:
• More than 9,000 jobs
• 121 Life Sciences companies
• 85 Life Sciences research
centres, chairs and clusters
• 600 research professors
• 10 of the world’s largest
pharmaceutical companies
operate in the city
Looking ahead, some key Life
Sciences industry events
booked in to the city include:
• 23rd International Symposium
on Fluorine Chemistry and 9th
International Symposium on
Fluorous Technologies – 2021
• Society for Molecular Biology
& Evolution (SMBE) Annual
Conference – 2020
• 13th Annual International
CRISPR Congress – 2019
• 16th Forum on Back and
Neck Pain Research in primary
care – 2019
While last year saw the
successful holding of the 10th
Annual Meeting of the Society
for the Neurobiology of
Language (SNL) and the
13th International Symposium
on Macrocyclic and
Supramolecular Chemistry.
Ambassadors’ Club
Below:
New hybrid
operating room
dedicated
to tertiary
cardiology at
the IUCPQ-UL
The new hybrid
operating room
combines all
the features of a
standard surgical
operating room
with those
found in an
interventional
cardiology
room, including
imaging
equipment.
Hybrid operating
rooms are
needed for a
wide variety of
procedures,
including the
percutaneous
aortic valve
replacements
and complex
extraction of
pacemaker
probes.
Quebec City has an Ambassadors’
Club created in 1996. It includes
university professors and
researchers, research centres,
as well as business people and
organisations from a variety of
sectors. These ambassadors draw
upon their networks of contacts
to convince decision-makers
and their organisations to choose
Québec City for their conferences.
One such ambassador is Simon
Duchesne, a researcher at the
Centre de l’Institut universitaire
en santé mentale de Québec,
Associate Professor and Research
Co-Director for the Radiology
of Université Laval’s Faculty of
Medicine and also Director for
the Canadian Consortium on
Neurodegeneration in Aging
(CCNA). He was responsible for
bringing the 20th International
MICCAI Conference in Québec
City in September 2017. That
event saw 1,000 medical imaging
specialists visit Québec City.
“Being able to host MICCAI is
somewhat like the Olympics. It’s
over four years in the making,
whereby you have to develop
a stellar bid and present it to the
governing body. And thanks to the
professional-looking, high-quality
pitch we developed, we won the
event,” said Dr Duchesne. “We are
the only city in the world that got to
host this event twice,” he added.
In 2015, Dr Duschesne won
Ambassador of the Year for having
organised The Breast Course in
Québec City and attracting 3,500
scientists, researchers and other
healthcare professionals from 60
countries. Brilliant scientific minds
from around the world came to
Québec City to discuss breast
cancer detection, diagnosis and
treatment.
The ambassador recognises
his strengths, however: “I’m much
better developing the content,
rather than the vehicles used to
get that content across. We could
not have pulled these two events
together without the help of the
Ambassadors’ Club. They provided
the logistical support for the events,
bringing together the expertise of
local partners, to pull the event off
without a hitch.”
To make the pitches, delegates
from the Ambassadors’ Club had
to travel to Japan in 2013 for a
pitch that lasted just minutes.
“Thanks to the professional-
looking, high-quality pitch we
developed, we won the event,"
said Dr Duschesne, who had
highlighted the city’s accessibility,
affordability beauty and tourist-
friendly atmosphere. “Along with
the Québec City Convention
Centre’s worldwide reputation for
organising events, we felt we had
several aces up our sleeves to
convince the judges that Québec
City was the best option. It also
helped that Québec City has one
of the highest concentrations of
medical imaging researchers and
specialists in North America,” he
added.
CONFERENCE & MEETINGS WORLD
9