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SCI Care: What Really Matters
SCI Care: What Really Matters
Inside ISCoS 2025: Why São Paulo’s Regional Symposia Matters
In this episode, Dr François Theron and Dr Federico Montero preview the upcoming 4th ISCoS International Regional Symposia, to be held on 18–19 July 2025 at the Rebouças Convention Center, São Paulo, Brazil.
They share what makes this year’s symposia exceptional — from the diversity of its global speaker faculty to the urgent clinical and scientific themes being addressed. Together, they explore how the event will bring together spinal cord injury specialists, researchers, and rehabilitation professionals across Latin America and beyond.
Whether you're an experienced clinician, early-career researcher, or allied health professional, this episode highlights why the ISCoS Regional Symposia 2025 is a must-attend event for anyone shaping the future of SCI care.
🗓️ Event Dates: 18–19 July 2025
📍 Location: Rebouças Convention Center, São Paulo, Brazil
🔗 Register now: https://iscossymposia4.org/
The opinions of our host and guests are their own; ISCoS does not endorse any individual viewpoints, given products or companies.
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The SCI Care: What Really Matters podcast aims to provide valuable insights and the most up-to-date information for those providing care to people with spinal cord injury (SCI) worldwide. The vision of the International Spinal Cord Society (ISCoS) is to "facilitate healthy and inclusive lives for people with spinal cord injury or dysfunction globally".
Contact us directly with any questions or comments at iscos@associationsltd.co.uk
Good afternoon or good day everybody. My name is Francois Theron, I'm currently serving as the chairperson of the Affiliated Societies and Networks Subcommittee of ESCOS, the International Spinal Cord Society, and I'm here today with Frederico Montero, from Costa Rica, regionally, but I think he's joining us from Houston today with his family. But, in any case, we're here to enlighten you on a very exciting, up-and-coming meeting that will be happening in South America soon, which is our fourth regional symposium that is being presented by ESCOS, and we have two of our committees, that sort of co-manage, this one which being the Affiliated Societies and the Education Committee. But Frederico has been instrumental in getting this project off the ground. It's a project that's close to my heart and we aim to actually roll out educational activities across the globe, and we've successfully started off.
Speaker 1:Originally, frederico, in your neck of the woods, when we had a sort of during the COVID pandemic, we had an online symposium. Following that, we had our second regional symposium in Korea last year. We also had a meeting in Eastern Europe towards the end of the year, and now we're coming to South America again. So, frederico, if you would like to introduce your society and who you represent and when this meeting is happening, I'm going to hand over the mic, otherwise everybody gets bored. So, federico, thanks for joining me, and can you tell us about what our aims are and where we're going for?
Speaker 2:Thank you, francois. Yes, I'm Federico Montero. I'm from Costa Rica, as Francois mentioned, and I'm the president of the Latin American and Caribbean Society of the Spinal Cord and we are the affiliated society for ISCOS in Latin America and the Caribbean region, which we are very proud of being the affiliated society, and, thanks to the ISCO's support and the initiative and the compromise of many people from our region, we've been carrying out different educational activities in the region and now we are going to have this great fourth East Coast symposium, as also Francois mentioned. The first, I would say experiment on a symposium was carried out in this region that will be carried out a great, great job on organizing and choosing people to talk during this two-day symposium, which will be on 18-19 July. So we are very excited about that, francois Right.
Speaker 1:Rivida, can you perhaps enlighten our audience on why Brazil? Why did you choose Brazil specifically as the host country for this meeting?
Speaker 2:Yes, well, that was a discussion we had about the place we were going to carry out this symposium and at the end, brazil was decided because of some reasons.
Speaker 2:One is because they have a very well organized rehab and spinal cord services in the city of Sao Paulo through the University of Sao Paulo and they have great hospitals as well in that city. But also the size of the country, the characteristics of the country, the number of people working on spinal cord injuries would be a great opportunity. But it is also a country that is accessible to many other, especially South American countries, not too much to Central America, but anyway. So Brazil is really a pioneer. They are doing a great job, they're doing research, they're doing many things in comparison with many of the other countries in Latin America and there are many people outside or away from the main cities that also need information about spinal cord injuries. So that will be a great opportunity to not only to have access to great, to know people that are dealing and doing research in spinal cord injury, but it will be an opportunity for Brazilian colleagues to learn more about spinal cord injuries and, of course, for all Latin American people that will be present there or online.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and, federico, you did mention that we they have a university affiliation and and what I gather from the organizing committee is that there's a close partnership with the university in Sao Paulo and that they form part of the venue as well. Would you like to enlighten us about the venue?
Speaker 2:will be in the university in a space also available through the university, so that will also help us to reduce costs, which is always an issue on these issues, and so I think we will. We will not really complain about anything in relation to the accessibility and the facilities that the university is providing us for this symposium.
Speaker 1:It sounds like a great networking opportunity as well among the participants, but would you like to inform our audience on some of the highlights of the program, any specific topics that will be covered that you think might be relevant to our audience?
Speaker 2:Yeah, if we say the program is quite a wide program that really includes the most important and many other issues related to spinal cord, from surgical procedures to electrophysiological issues related to spinal cord injury.
Speaker 2:So urological aspects, management of spasticity, and many other countries, latin American countries and also from ISCO's specific colleagues also. So it's a combination of a variety of very important, very relevant themes, issues that will be discussed very relevant to the region, which not everybody has the resources that at this moment the Brazilian colleagues have. There are a lot of disparities and differences in health access, in access to health services in the region. Some countries have more, many countries have little, and specifically in spinal cord injuries. That's a very relevant issue because that's something that really the services for spinal cord injury are not very well organized in most Latin American and Caribbean countries. So this is another relevant issue for this symposium that will raise awareness about the relevance and importance of spinal cord injuries amongst not only the professionals but also, we hope, amongst the decision makers on health issues. So this, in that sense, it will have also an impact in the region.
Speaker 1:It sounds great. Thanks, frederico, and I would like to, yes, highlight that you know that the team and the organizing committee has done a sterling job in getting this program put together in quick succession, and I think they've done a sterling job on that. The one issue that has always, in organising these regional symposium, been highlighted was the language issues. I think that large parts of your neck of the wood have two main languages, mainly Portuguese, and then Spanish. Spanish and Portuguese. How have the organizers managed to address this? The meeting will be conducted, I assume, in Portuguese or in Spanish, and then, hopefully, you can inform our audience just on the availability of translation.
Speaker 2:Yes, that was an issue we had at the beginning, because Brazil is the only country in the region, is the biggest one, but is providing through a facility for translation. So a resource, a tool that will allow to listen or translate immediately in many languages will be available. So that issue has been really solved, we're happy about that, and there will be no obstacle for communication. Everybody will have access to translation, mainly from English or Portuguese to Spanish and vice versa, so that will not be an issue that sounds great.
Speaker 1:So we can put everybody's worries to rest that they will be able to participate and will be able to understand all the lectures during the heat.
Speaker 2:Anyone present or online will be able to listen to the presentations in the language they wish or they can.
Speaker 1:Well, federico, thanks for your time, and just from my side I'd like to on behalf of all the affiliates across the globe. You know that we at this stage have 19 official, but hopefully soon 23 affiliated societies and networks. We started off in South America with our regional symposia, as we discussed earlier, and you have certainly provided the impetus in South and Central America and the Caribbean for us to build on. So congratulations to SLEP and you and your team, and Daniel and the organizing committee. They've done a stirring job. So I would like to take the opportunity, on behalf of myself and the bigger ESCAS family, to congratulate all of you.
Speaker 1:We look forward to fruitful discussions and to stimulate some new thoughts amongst our participants and then, as always with these meetings, I think the networking opportunities and recruiting to know people and building bridges will stand us to good stead in many years to come and hopefully strengthen the role of ISCOS to maintain and to educate our members and our systems to deliver excellent care in managing spinal cord injuries to our patients. After all, that's the main aim of ESCOS and all of us as clinicians working in the field. So again from the bottom of my heart to you and your team and to all the people that have worked so hard. I hope you enjoy the meeting and that you will have future discussions. Thank you for your time and all the good that you've done.
Speaker 2:Let me just say, friends, we are really very grateful with you. Your coordination of the affiliated societies has been a stimulus, has helped us a lot to continue and to work as best we can. So thank you, and thank you, thanks, ISCO, for all the support we get from the region.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Frederica.