MND Conference at St Christopher's

Mairead Liston attended the St Christopher’s MND Annual Conference 2025. This highly informative event served as a crucial gathering for specialists dedicated to advancing the care and treatment of Motor Neurone Disease (MND). The conference, jointly hosted by St Christopher’s Hospice and King’s College hospital, is renowned for providing a multidisciplinary perspective on managing this complex and progressive neurological condition.

The agenda was packed with expert speakers, focusing on clinical management, ethical considerations, and the patient voice.

Key themes and discussion

Symptom management

Presentations covered the latest research into effective strategies for managing challenging symptoms common in MND, such as choking, feeding difficulties, twitching, and non-invasive ventilation (NIV).

The patient voice

A major recurring theme was the vital necessity of listening to and advocating for the patient and carer perspective in all aspects of care and research, ensuring treatments align with individual wishes.

Technological innovation

Updates were provided on emerging technologies, including high-performance speech prosthetics and brain-computer interfaces (BCIs), aimed at restoring communication and enhancing independence

Ethical and legal issues

Difficult but essential topics, such as mental capacity assessment and legal perspectives on assisted dying, were explored to support ethical practice in end-of-life care.

Multidisciplinary approach

The event highlighted the power of multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) and the need for strong collaboration between specialists – from dieticians and respiratory consultants to palliative care teams – to deliver holistic support.

Invaluable connections

The conference offered Mairead Liston an invaluable opportunity to connect with this specialist community, including meeting the practitioners from the Lane Fox team. She was able to absorb the latest insights that will directly inform the deliver of top-tier complex care at Cavendish Homecare.