Hello, everyone, and welcome to this webinar on what we would love our allied professional colleagues to know before coming to HRS 2025, which will be next week, believe it or not, in San Diego from April 24th through the 27th. I am Sana Al-Khatib. I'm an electrophysiologist at Duke University, and I've had the pleasure of being the program chair for HRS 2025, and I am joined by a wonderful group of people here who will be also presenting during this webinar. I do want to take a minute to thank all of you guys for all your contributions to the program, and I want to assure everyone that we have put a great program together for you. And here you have the names of all the people who have contributed. Several of the people on this webinar are members of the program committee and work tirelessly to put together a great program for you. Next, please. Turn it over to Serena. Good evening, everyone. I'm Serena Bridges, nurse practitioner from Nashville, Tennessee. Heart Rhythm 2025 kicks off next Thursday, April 24th, and trust me, you are going to want to be there when it does. From 1 to 5 p.m., 13 session rooms will be in full swing. Let's talk about the highlights. The first is the Women in Research Summit with the title Breaking Down Gender Disparities in Cardiovascular Clinical Trials Leadership. This is a session that will discuss the barriers women face in clinical research. Expect bold conversations, impactful presentations, and panel discussions from leading researchers in the field. Next up is the Global Summit, which turns its focus to the critical issue of sudden cardiac death. Key opinion leaders will take the stage to examine the wide-reaching impact of sudden cardiac death and explore current and emerging strategies for prevention, diagnosis, and research. Heart Rhythm Society will also highlight its ongoing effort to address this complex challenge on a global scale. Now, backed by popular demand for Heart Rhythm 2025 is the Business of EP. There will be three sessions that will cover must-know topics like building a multidisciplinary team, navigating ambulatory surgical centers and private equity, and bringing innovation into clinical practice. New for 2025 is the Featured Poster Session, showcasing 10 standout abstracts from the Allied Professionals category. Presenters will be available during the session, ready to chat and walk you through their work, and posters will remain on display throughout the entire meeting for those of us who need a second or third look. Finally, the Allied Professionals Program Committee is hosting two afternoon sessions next Thursday, an Ivory Review for those brushing up on exam essentials, and the other session covering rhythm abnormalities and congenital heart disease. So, as you can see, day one of Heart Rhythm 2025 sets the tone for what promises to be an unforgettable meeting. Next up is Heather, who will talk to you more about the sessions occurring on Friday. Hello, I'm Heather McLeod. I'm a genetic counselor on the planning team. On Friday, we will kick off with an opening plenary session with the immediate past FDA Commissioner, Dr. Robert Califf. Following that, there will be 15 session rooms going from 10 to 5, so tons of content to get your CEUs and all your educational needs. Following that, we have late-breaking clinical trials at two different times, oral abstracts and poster sessions. At 3.30, we'll have the AP Roundtable. There will be Hyde Parks at three different times, and AP sessions that may be of interest, Transforming Healthcare Practice, Achieving Excellence in Atrial Fibrillation Patient Care, MRIs and CIEDs, as well as a session on the role of artificial intelligence. Up next, Monica. Hi, my name's Monica. I'm a PA at Penn Medicine in Pennsylvania, and I am part of the Allied Professional Council, as well as the Education Council. And Saturday looks very exciting. We have 15 session rooms from 8 to 4.30 p.m. Notable sessions include the first-ever Never-Ending Conversation. It's a history review of HRS and the field of EP, which is an ongoing running four-hour straight lecture from two speakers rotating every 15 minutes to share their knowledge and memories of HRS and their vision for the future for HRS, which includes a lot of information for the Allied Health Professionals as well. This takes place in our Hyde Park. Also on Saturday are two oral abstract sessions at 8 a.m. and 3.30 p.m., as well as poster sessions from 9.30, 12, and 2.30. The AP sessions, this is always my favorite. I always say it's great to check out all the sessions, but your AP sessions are wonderful. They include specific sessions on arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathies and genetic testing, cardiac arrhythmias, ablations, CIED management. We have an optimizing genotype-informed approaches for arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathies, which is great, involving all the latest genetic testing and risk stratification and exercise, which is a joint session at 8 a.m. And then we have challenging arrhythmia cases for the Allied Professionals. This is always wonderful, having some case presentations at 9.45, and then a practical guide to CIED management for the Allied Professional at 11.15, and then an advanced optimization of CIED settings for the Allied Professional. And then last but not least, impact of Allied Professionals play in CIED management at 3.30. All of these sessions are going to be so informative and are led by your peers and colleagues of the Allied Health Professionals. And next, we have Madeline. Hi, everybody. My name is Madeline. I'm a nurse practitioner at Stanford at the West Coast. So at this time, HRS will be a little bit closer to home than it usually is. So Sunday, we will have another exciting day. Sunday programming includes six session rooms running from 8 a.m. in the morning to 2 p.m. in the afternoon, with notable sessions, including the finally breaking clinical trial sessions, the final oral abstract sessions, the final poster sessions, and the final Hyde Park of Heart Rhythm 2025. There are two lectureship award sessions featuring four award winners. And finally, the AP-specific programming on Sunday will include a session on post-mortem genetic testing, as well as detecting death of patients on remote monitoring. Heather now will follow with some info about additional sessions and event spotlights. Hi, everybody. My name is Heather Ross. I am a nurse practitioner at Honor Health in Scottsdale in Phoenix, Arizona, and also a professor of health equity and health policy in the College of Nursing at Arizona State University. And, you know, it's – I think the universe pointed this slide in my direction because all of these additional sessions and events have food associated with them. And anyone who knows me knows that I am very worried about where the next snack is going to come from, always. So I really encourage you to join us on Thursday for the President's Welcome Reception at 5 p.m. And then on Friday morning, you can start with your early morning breakfast snacks at 7.15. This is the Allied Professional Networking Breakfast. It's an opportunity for you not only to meet each other, first-time attendees, but also some of us veterans with enough gray hair to go around that matches all of the times that we've been to the Heart Rhythm meeting and kind of get the lay of the land while you're on the land there. Tickets are not required in advance. The AP Networking Breakfast is going to be held at the Pavilion Terrace, and it is a first-come, first-served event. Then on Friday afternoon, we have the Women in EP Luncheon. That is at noon on Friday. It does require tickets to be purchased in advance to guarantee your spot, and you can do that through the registration platform. Now on Saturday, we've got our Allied Professional Luncheon. It also requires advanced purchase tickets, which you can get through the registration system. And Saturday afternoon is our FHRS Induction and Awards Ceremony. That does not require tickets to that awards ceremony. That's in room 6B at the San Diego Convention Center, and it is followed by the Heart Rhythm Gala. Now, the Heart Rhythm Gala, super exciting, ticketed event, sold out. But do keep an eye on – you can continue to monitor the website and the app that you're going to learn about in case additional tickets become available. And then finally, on Sunday morning, April 27th, join us for the President's Sunrise Social at 8 a.m. That's in the EPI Center, and you can hear directly from Dr. Ken Ellenbogen as he discusses the activities that Heart Rhythm Society has accomplished over the last year and will answer your questions about HRS leadership. And let me pass it now to Rachel. Hey, everybody. So excited to see lots of new faces and first-time attendees. I would like to welcome everybody on behalf of myself. I'm the Vice Chair of the AP Council, and Martha Ferreira, who is the Chair of the AP Council, along with our HRS liaison, Ashley Martinez, who is fantastic and has helped put together some of the programming we're going to talk about here a little bit, particularly with respect to the AP Lounge. I'm a nurse practitioner at Carilion Virginia Tech Radford School of Medicine in Roanoke, Virginia, and we're going to talk about some other networking opportunities. So in addition to some of the sessions that Heather was just talking to you about, another fantastic opportunity to have a little more of a casual format where you can really interact face-to-face with both your peers and also with experts in the field of these roundtable sessions. I attended several at the Sister Meeting HRX in Atlanta last fall, and they were dynamite and just a great way to get up close with people. Several to point out for the APs, there's an Advocacy Roundtable that will happen at Friday at 10.30, EGM Review on Friday at noon, there will be a Speed Mentoring Roundtable Friday at 1.30, one specific to us, AP Roundtable on Friday at 3.30, and then an American Board of Cardiovascular Medicine, what is the latest Saturday, and finally capping it off with a Research Roundtable on Sunday at 9.30. And these are just dynamite options for you to come ask questions, bring your burning clinical questions with you. If you're a first-time attendee, you may be a little bit newer, but really a great opportunity to get exposed to people and expand your network. And then I will strongly encourage you, and we'll talk about this in a little more depth here in just a bit, we have a whole slide on it, there are also lots of fantastic networking opportunities in the AP Lounge. You will find Ashley Martinez, who is our fearless leader, posted up in the hub adjacent to the AP Lounge, and we'll get to know her quite well. But she will be a great resource for connecting you with some of us who are on this call and others who have been down the path before. I'm so really excited to see everyone and we'll talk a little more about the AP lounge in a few minutes, but I'm gonna turn it over to Julie Thomas, who is one of the planners to talk about how to navigate the meeting most effectively. Thanks, Rachel. So I'm gonna speak about navigating the meeting. So there are many tools. So my name is Julie Thomas, I'm a PA, working at North Shore University Hospital out in New York. So there are many tools to help you navigate the meeting, the main being the 2025 mobile app and online planner. So if you haven't downloaded the app yet on your phone, I strongly recommend that you do that after this meeting. It's a great valuable resource and tool to guide you through the meeting. Be sure that every time you open the app, you check for a data update by scrolling down on the home screen. If a data update is available, a red bar will show across the top alerting you to update the app. And this will guarantee, this is what will guarantee your app has the most up-to-date information from session times, location, presenters. It tells you when certain hot sessions are coming up as well as gives you a nice little map and allows you to sort of plan your sessions beforehand and sort of create your calendar for the HRS meeting. The epicenter, which I know shortly, Madeline will be discussing a little more about that, is the hub for HRS members and attendees to gather. HRS staff will be there to answer the questions you may have about HRS membership or the meeting itself. They're also, HRS staff are also all around the building as well and can be identified in black and white attire with gray vest as shown on the screen. So many of us who can't find rooms are a little lost. They're a great resource to help you, guide you through the conference area. So definitely don't hesitate to reach out to any of them with any questions to help you navigate through the conference. Attendees are encouraged to grab ribbons to add to their badges to identify their status such as first times attendee or allied professionals. So when you do go into check-in and register and grab your badge, there's usually a little stand with many different ribbons on it. So we do encourage you to grab one of those ribbons to identify yourself. This is an easy way to identify others with similar interests and backgrounds and gives an easy way to introduce yourself. So I'm gonna pass it over to Sana. Yeah, no, thank you very much. So very important to remember that you can actually register on site if you haven't registered yet. Many of us have already registered. I encourage you to register now if you can. And then of course you can pick up your badge on site as well. And here you'll see a whole defoyer. These are the dates and the times when you can actually register and or pick up your badge. Next, please. So this is actually the layout of the convention center. I turn it over to Serena to go over this. Thank you. So this is pretty much the layout of the San Diego Convention Center. All of the educational sessions will occur on the second floor of this convention center. Kind of the hub is the sales pavilion that we spoke of. And the educational sessions will occur on, can occur on either side of that pavilion. The sales pavilion is kind of the hub. And within that is the epicenter, the oral abstracts hub, Hyde Park, the speaker resource center, plus all of the lounges for fellows of Heart Rhythm Society, fellows in training, and the allied professional lounge will occur within that or can be found in the sales pavilion. Next up will be Heather. Thank you. There are a number of different tracks and session types at HRS 2025. There are 11 different session categories representing different disciplines and 13 different session types. Some of them are slide-based, but if you're tired of slides, the hands-on Hyde Park panel discussions, posters, and round tables are slide-free. And something I especially like about the app and the website is that if there's a specific topic you want to focus on, there's a search everything function. So you can, if this feels a little overwhelming, you can just type in some keywords and find what you're looking for. Next slide. Next slide. Monica. Hi, I'm gonna be talking about the exhibit hall, which I kind of, like Heather Ross, I'm always looking for food and drink and camaraderie amongst the colleagues. And this is the place to be. The exhibit hall has over 110 exhibitors, which will be displaying and demonstrating the latest products and services from technical stuff to integrative stuff, hands-on stuff, anything you can think of, books, education stuff is all gonna be in the exhibit hall. The exhibit halls hours are Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Friday is 10 to 5.30, Saturday is nine to five, and Sunday is 8.30 to 11.30. There are, in the exhibit hall features, the abstract pavilion where the seven poster sessions will be held. They occur throughout the weekend. Also in the exhibit hall are two rhythm theaters, which will include industry-led presentations throughout the weekend as well, which is also very exciting to learn about all the new technology. The round table area features several tables intended for small group discussions with key opinion leaders on various topics. The mobile app contains the schedule of the round table sessions. So you'll be able to get a better feel of what you wanna go visit and what you wanna learn on that day. And as well as the hands-on skills training is excellent. I did it for the first time last year and I can't talk more about it. It's very exciting. And then last, but certainly not least, is the exhibit hall oasis hours. They have espresso service, they have coffee, juices, all that stuff. And there's also happy hour, Friday and Saturday from four to 5.30 and Saturday from four to five. Again, a great way to get to network with your colleagues and peers and meet new people. But every, and the key, the key card on here with the view of the floor plan exhibitors is also great. It seems overwhelming, but honestly, every step you take, whether, no matter what part of the exhibit hall you go to, you will definitely love each and every aspect of it. So I say, use it as a break in the education session for you all. Next is Madeline. Okay, so the epicenter will be the hub for the HRS members and those interested in getting an HRS membership. It will be centralized in the sales pavilion and features seating, games, buttons, giveaways. You can get yourself some HRS branded items from the HRS shop. There will be coffee and the happy hour services as we already mentioned before. Special meetups are scheduled in the spaces and you will be able to find them also on your mobile app. HRS staff is on hand each day to answer your questions about the membership, HRS programs, as well as to help you to navigate through the meeting itself. You can see here the hours. I'm not kind of reading them all out. Okay, Heather will continue with concessions. See all the universe points me toward the food or points the food toward me. We've talked a lot about espresso and beer and I don't wanna stop you if espresso and beer is the fuel that you need to get through a big and exciting meeting. And I'm just saying there's plenty of HRS meetings that I have been fueled almost exclusively by espresso and beer. I don't necessarily recommend that. And that's why we wanted to highlight a few additional concessions in case you wanted, I don't know, solid food. There are definitely additional options on site. You don't have to leave the San Diego Convention Center and you can still have full nutrition. So we do have the exhibit hall attendee brunch and that's first come first served on Friday and Saturday morning. So Friday from 10 to 11 and Saturday from nine to 10. There are also, and we mentioned before the women in EP luncheon on Friday, the LA professional luncheon on Saturday. Those are both ticketed events. And then there's additional concessions. So in lobby E, you can find a Starbucks, you can find a Cafe Express in the sales pavilion. And there's an Auntie Anne's and Mrs. Fields in case you said, you know what? I don't have enough of is carbs. That is located in lobby F, lobby 20 and lobby six. And then there are additional concessions in the exhibit hall. And I do wanna just go back to what Monica said, wandering around the exhibitors is a great source of nutrition, maybe not great nutrition. And last year, one of my favorite points of the meeting was that the booth next to the Ozempic booth had, I believe donuts, which just seemed like it was this like beautifully reinforcing message of healthcare. But there, you know, suffice it to say, there's plenty of concessions opportunity and I'll turn it to Rachel. Well, and to continue the food theme, we also hope to provide you some other options for nutrition or non-nutrition in the AP lounge. And speaking of other exciting things in the exhibit hall, Heather, I hope that we, the other fun thing is hopefully we will have puppy playtime again this year, which they brought to ACC this year and was very popular for a puppy stress relief. I think we can all benefit from that. But in addition to wandering around the exhibit hall to connect with your peers and colleagues, we on the AP council are very excited. We've been helping coordinate some additional programming in the AP lounge. For those of us who have been around a while, the AP lounge has just really grown and Ashley Martinez gets a lot of credit for helping us find some industry support in really building this out. And last year, it was just completely dynamite and a fantastic place to connect. So the AP lounge is open every day. We have some specific programming listed here that I'll point out to you, but really make this your home and your hub, especially if you're a first timer, you can find many of us older timers hanging around and identify us by our badges. You can also find Ashley Martinez. So we have some programming specific to the lounge pointed out here a little bit every day. We have a best practices talk on Thursday, some other expert speakers coming in to give us some education content. These are non-CME content events, but also other things that we do on the AP council to try to enrich and encourage and engage you. This is a good opportunity to find out about the HRS LEAP program of which a number of us are graduates. And as you are in HRS for a few years is a great way to continue to build your leadership skills, but probably even more importantly as a fantastic way to network and build a network of like-minded people and honestly friends. I've made many friends through this program. I'm looking at Serena. And so, really would encourage you to check that out. We're also gonna have a research awards, SADS Foundation Research Awards Ceremony on Saturday. And then also gonna be talking about the AP experience at the sister meeting HRX. So it's a good way to find out about that meeting as well, which tends to be a little more innovation leaning. And then we'll have some content on Sunday as well, mostly a hangout day. Ashley is also putting together some additional resources so you can learn about more things like the AP Journal Club, which we're rebooting starting in May, giving everybody a break. And we'll be having every other month, I believe. So looking forward to meeting everyone in the AP lounge, but come hang out, find snacks, find your friends, especially this is a really great place if you are like myself and maybe the only person in your group who is attending or maybe you in a position, a good way to find other people who are like you and people that you can go hang out with offline after the meeting as well. And so with that, I'm gonna turn it over to Julie, who's gonna talk about embargo dates and times and what does that mean. Julie, are you here? Yeah, Julie, you're muted. Sorry, I forgot to unmute myself. So, listed there are some embargo dates and times. So, some key dates to remember are the embargo times for the abstracts and late-breaking clinical trials. So, prior to those dates, you know, the release of title and authors of the abstracts and late-breaking clinical trials are allowed, but no other details of the abstracts or late-break clinical trials can be released prior to those dates and times. So, for all general abstracts, including those presented as posters and oral abstracts, as well as for late-breaking submissions being presented as posters, the embargo date is Thursday, April 24th at 11 a.m. Pacific time. For the remainder of late-breaking clinical trial submissions presented in late- breaking clinical trial sessions, the embargo date time is one hour prior to the presentation in San Diego. So, I'm going to lead it back to Sana. Yeah, no, thank you very much. And so, additional things to keep in mind is that there will be a headshot lounge in the sales pavilion, so a lot is going on in the sales pavilion. These are complimentary headshots for people who are interested. These will be emailed to you. Mental pause, as you mentioned, this will hopefully help people relax as they play with puppies at the meeting. This is always a huge success, so certainly, if you are a dog person, make sure to check it out. Photo opportunities located throughout the event will be provided as well. And of course, if you need a break and want to go and explore San Diego, definitely feel free to do so. Next, please. So, with regard to after the meeting, as you heard, a lot is going to happen at the meeting. A lot of content will be presented through different formats, different sessions. All registered attendees will have access to the online meeting platform through December 31, 2025. Certainly take advantage of this because, again, you're not going to be able to make it to all the sessions. I personally feel like I need to be attending all these sessions that all sound amazing, but I also realize that I can't be in different places at the same time, so I'll be sure to check out some of these sessions online. Most sessions, with the exception of in-person only sessions, will be available on demand, and this will happen within 24 hours, or less than that even, after the end of the meeting. Make sure to claim credit for your attendance at the meeting. Most of these sessions will provide you with CEU credit, so make sure to do that. Not all of them, however, so make sure to check that if that's a major goal for you at the meeting. Of course, we will be sending you a feedback survey in about a week following the meeting. Please share your feedback. Within HRS, we've always been responsive to the feedback that we get, and so please tell us the things that you love, the things that you didn't love as much, because we always want to strive to do better. This QR code here provides you with information regarding how to claim credit. Next, please. Panel discussion here, if you have any questions, please let us know. I saw a couple of questions come through the Q&A feature here. I think all of them have been answered in terms of where some of the things will be, like Hyde Park, what it is, where it will be, the sales pavilion, as you heard. The women's luncheon, I saw a question about that. I'm not sure what the room is, but you'll be able to find it on the app, so the search function in the app is amazing. Just type in women in EP luncheon, you'll be able to find the session, and it guides you to the room. As you heard, you will have to purchase a ticket and try to do so before the meeting, because tickets do sell out. I do want to thank all of you here, by the way, for your excitement about the meeting. Obviously, I love this meeting, and I think it's going to be wonderful, and many thanks to all of you who have contributed to the planning, and I really look forward to seeing all of you at the meeting, but with this, we'll stop and see if anyone has any questions. So, I have four points to make, and they are brief. What to bring. People always want to know what to bring. I suggest that you make sure you have these four things. One, a sweater or a light jacket in case it is cool in the room. Two, a water bottle, and you can always access water from filling stations. Three, an external battery to recharge your phone because you've been referring to the app the whole day, and you also are going to be texting your colleagues and making dinner plans. And then four, comfortable shoes. Now, I love shoes. This is not the time to bust out your brand-new awesome stilettos. They are awesome, I'm very sure, and I also invite you to look around at everybody on day two, so on Friday, who is limping around in flip-flops with their feet covered with band-aids. Don't be that person. That is my best advice. Thank you, Heather. Very sage advice. I agree. Any other comments from anyone? I do. I just have. I kind of will kind of agree with what Heather said, but I would just want to add to all new timers or anyone who's coming back to really come ready to learn. You will learn a lot. Come ready to connect and network with people. These are people who are in the field who can help you, and just come with the mindset to be inspired. You'll leave feeling inspired if you get what you're supposed to get out of Heart Rhythm 2025. Well said. Thank you. And I think what I loved, especially last year, was the AP Lounge. I think, as a community, it was a wonderful addition to HRS. It was informative, it was collegial, it was fun, there was food. But even if you would have taken away the food, I probably still would have went, because it was just a great asset to the whole entire convention from an AHP standpoint. And also the AP Breakfast. I know it's early, but try and get up and go, even if I still go, and I'm year 20 of HRS, and I love it each time. As a first-time attendee, I really promote that as well. Yeah. Second, what Monica says, the breakfast in particular is fantastic. You've got many APs. And the thing that's really terrific about HRS and ACC, of which I'm also a member, is the AP section is just so diverse. We represent a lot of different professions. Not only are there nurses and nurse practitioners, but there are CBTs, there are clinical pharmacists, all kinds of folks that are represented, and not only around the country, but around the world. So you meet the most interesting people. But that's a good way to get people all together in one space. And we're working to have that be a dynamic networking opportunity so that those of you who are newer to HRS can get to meet some of us who have been around a little bit longer and interact with us in person. So I normally have long hair that's up right now. So if you're looking for me, it may be in a ponytail or down. But please feel free to use those of us who are on this call as a resource. I would also strongly encourage you to start hanging out and playing with the app, if not now, then while you're at the airport. And bookmark as much as you can. I usually will have multiple sessions bookmarked for any given time. And then I make a minute by minute decision about what am I going to next. But because so much is recorded, you can go back to it later and get credit for it, which has just been tremendous on HRS 365, which is great. Wonderful. Julie, did you want to say something? I think Rachel said it best. I think I was just reiterating what everyone said. And especially I know way back when, when it was my first time and I had no other colleagues coming, I agree with Monica and Rachel about the EP lounge is a great place to network and not be afraid to make new friends. And so I always say stop in lounge, as Monica said, even though the breakfast is a little early, but Hey, it's free breakfast. And we know like many of us where our jobs pay for only a certain amount of for reimbursement. It's a great way for free food, but also get to meet new friends as well. And and when you meet new friends, you have somebody to help guide you through the rest of the conference. So it's going to be a great time, hopefully better weather than some places we're experiencing right now. But I think it, I think everyone will enjoy HRS if it's your first time here. Absolutely. I think everybody will. Thank you so much to all of you and thank you for everything you've done. I do want to thank the attendees as well. And trust me, you're not going to be lost. There are so many resources to guide you from the app to a lot of HRS staff who are so friendly and are always willing to help. If you see any of us, please, at least for me, I would love to meet you in person at the meeting. Feel free to stop me. I'd love to say hello. And thank you so much for your interest and have safe travels to the meeting and looking forward to seeing all of you in San Diego. Good night.

Heart Rhythm Society

2025 meeting

San Diego

Women in Research Summit

sudden cardiac death

networking opportunities

CEU opportunities

allied professionals

arrhythmia management

networking

artificial intelligence

genetic testing