GWAAC Symposium

Question 1

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Stephen is a consultant in emergency and aeromedical retrieval medicine. He has been a Scottish mountain rescue team member for over 20 years and has acted as medical officer on 7 international expeditions in mountain, desert, jungle and arctic environments. He established the first expedition medicine course in the UK. Based on his experiences of performing under pressure in these environments, Stephen's book, Peak Performance, was published in 2019. Stephen is an Honorary Senior Lecturer in the University of Glasgow and led the team establishing the Diploma in retrieval and transfer medicine for the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. Stephen is attracted to the challenges of emergency medicine in demanding remote environments with limited resources. Stephen’s main interest is optimising team performance in high pressure situations. He researches, writes and speaks on both of these topics and provides advice to a wide range of commercial and government organisations. Stephen is a Fellow of The Royal College of Emergency Medicine, The Royal College of Surgeons, The Royal College of Physicians and The Royal Geographical Society.

Question 2

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Tom is a Consultant in Emergency Medicine having worked at St Mary’s in London and London’s Air Ambulance, before moving to Sydney as acting Executive Director of Medical Services and Research, NSW Ambulance Staff Specialist in Prehospital and Retrieval medicine, NSW Ambulance.

Tom was previously a coach for the British Rowing Team; and has worked with coaches from England Football, Rugby, and British Sailing, Canoeing, Cycling, Paralympic and Motorsport organisations.

Dr Evens will explore some key concepts and techniques from the discipline of performance psychology, which will be useful to clinicians practicing in high-consequence, high-load situations. Drawing from experience working with athletes and coaches across a range of elite sport and business organisations, we will identify performance and mindset skills relevant to both individual and teams.

Question 3

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Floss is a Personal Development & Mindset Coach helping footballers, their families and those in the industry to thrive on, off and beyond the pitch.

With a 22 year career working in boardrooms, pitchside, at training grounds and in the tunnels in Premier League football, she was afforded a unique perspective of the industry and its intensity and pressures. Her clients range from directors to backroom staff and business execs to players. Her work is focussed on building up the human to thrive, no matter what position they hold.

Floss is an Accredited Mindset Coach and Certified Therapeutic Coach, founded Mindset Five in 2021 and lives in Norfolk on a working farm with her husband and two children.

Floss will be bringing her unique perspective to performing as an individual so that you can contribute to the team in high pressure, high performance environments.

Question 4

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Dr John Martin was appointed Chief Executive of South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust in December 2023.

John has joined the organisation on secondment from his role as Chief Paramedic and Quality Officer and Deputy Chief Executive at London Ambulance Service NHS Trust.

An experienced Executive Board member with a wealth of clinical and operational experience across ambulance, acute, community and mental health NHS services, John is also a Visiting Professor in Paramedic Science at the University of Hertfordshire.

John joined London Ambulance Service NHS Trust in March 2021 and was the first Chief Paramedic to sit on an ambulance Trust Board.

John was formerly a director at Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust and has dedicated his career to improving patient care and developing the paramedic profession.

John has been active in developing the College of Paramedics for many years, and in May 2023, he finished his second term as the College’s President.

John will be sharing his vast wealth of experience as a clinical paramedic in addition to the lessons that can be learned from team performance at a trust/system level.

Question 5

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Olivia is a SENR registered Performance Nutritionist, and is the current nutritionist with Brighton & Hove Albion WFC and former nutritionist to Aston Villa Women's FC. She has a wealth of experience across a breadth of sports working in elite sporting environments. Olivia is passionate about supporting the athlete in a range of circumstances to ensure their performance is always at the top of their game.

Olivia will be sharing her experience and knowledge around fuelling for performance and lessons that can be learned for maintaining energy levels, concentration and the ability to perform around the clock.

Question 6

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Christian is a dual qualified Specialist Paramedic in Critical Care with GWAAC and and Advanced Critical Care Practitioner at the Royal Devon and Exeter ICU. Christian has extensive pre-hospital experience and is now layering his knowledge and experience from in-hospital to his clinical practice. Christian is a previous winner of the Churchill Scholarship where he travelled to Australia and New Zealand to compare and learn from different critical care systems.

Christian will be sharing his knowledge and shared experiences around CRM and how “to get things done” on scene, as well as his reflections on what we can learn from other models around the world.

Question 7

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Harvey is a Consultant in Emergency Medicine at Bristol Royal Infirmary and a pre-hospital Emergency Medicine Consultant with GWAAC. He has been the Defence Consultant Advisor for PHEM and has served in the field on multiple operational deployments.

Harvey will be sharing his unique insights into elite clinical team performance both in the military and civilian worlds and lessons learned and shared between the two.

Question 8

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Dan is an Advanced Practitioner in Critical Care with Great Western Air Ambulance Charity, having joined in 2020 from London Ambulance Service, where he worked on the Motorcycle Response Unit, London’s Air Ambulance and Essex and Herts Air Ambulance, and was one of the original Advanced Paramedics in Critical Care. Through his experiences working as a solo practitioner and in small clinical teams within wider multi-disciplinary systems, Dan has developed an interest in how we best operate as a team and how we can get the most out of ourselves and others in high performing systems.

Dan’s talk will focus on “Creating a culture for Team Performance”, and will hopefully draw upon the lessons learned throughout the day from our expert panel of speakers to provide a blueprint for developing your own high-performance teams.

Question 9

Getting to Ashton Gate

Answer

Ashton Gate has some excellent transport links. The stadium's postcode is BS3 2EJ, but if you plan on driving, please use BS3 2LQ.

If you're not sure how best to join us, there are various ways for you to travel, including road, train or bus.

Driving to Ashton Gate

Central Bristol, including many roads near Ashton Gate, is now part of a Clean Air Zone (CAZ) where non-compliant vehicles will be charged between £9 and £100 per day to drive. Full details on the CAZ including maps, schedule of charges and a vehicle compliance checker can be found at www.cleanairforbristol.org/caz.

Directions

FROM M5: Leave the M5 motorway at junction 18, travel along the Portway (A4) following the signs for Bristol Airport/Taunton (A38). Over the swing bridge (Brunel Way), branching left into Winterstoke Road, and left again at the traffic lights for Ashton Gate for the Ashton Road car park or continue along the A3029 and turn left at the next roundabout for the Winterstoke Road car park.

FROM M4: At junction 19, exit onto M32 towards Bristol. Continue on A4032. Turn left at A4044/Bond Street. Continue to follow A4044. At Temple Circus Gyratory, take the 2nd exit onto A4/Templegate. At the roundabout, take the 2nd exit onto A370/York Road. Continue to follow A370. Go through one roundabout. Slight left to merge onto Brunel Way. Take the next left at traffic lights for Ashton Gate. This route directs through the City Centre and journey time can be significantly increased due to traffic. Travelling along the Portway via the M5 is often quicker. For the Portway, leave the M4 at junction 20 and join the M5 South-bound, then follow the above directions for M5.

Parking on the day is free for Symposium attendees.

Bus

Ashton Gate is well connected to Bristol and surrounding areas by an extensive public bus network. Buses that stop near the stadium include:
m2
24
X1
X4
X6
X7
X9

Train

Ashton Gate is well served by local and national rail services.

Bristol Temple Meads

Mainline station with trains running directly to most parts of the UK, including Wales and Scotland. A 50-minute walk from Ashton Gate Stadium or use one of the public bus routes, including the m2 service.

Parson Street

Serves much of Somerset, South Wales and Bristol (journey time to Temple Meads approximately 5 minutes). Please note Parson Street does not have step-free access. A 15-minute walk.

Cycling

Ashton Gate is easily accessed by bike via a number of dedicated cycle paths in Bristol. They also have plenty of bike racks at the stadium (96 in total) as well as a free to use handy bike pump.

For more information on getting to Ashton Gate, and to access tools such as route planners, visit the Ashton Gate website.

GWAAC Symposium

2026 Theme: Innovation

GWAAC Symposium 2026

Key details

Pravha Lounge, Ashton Gate Stadium

Friday 16 October, 09:00

Tickets £18 - £35

What to expect at the GWAAC Symposium 2026

Arrive for a tea and coffee before settling into a day of informative and inspiring talks focused on team performance in PHEM.

Critical Care Doctor, Lily explains what she enjoyed most about the 2024 Clinical Symposium

I've really enjoyed hearing people from the non-medical areas; Floss talking about coaching and football, then Olivia talking about nutrition. It's been really interesting to look outside medicine and see what things apply to us.

A taste of our 2024 Symposium

Speakers for our 2026 Symposium are yet to be confirmed. In the meantime, here is a taste of the industry experts who spoke at the 2024 event.

Dr Stephen Hearns

His talk – “Communication under pressure”

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Dr Tom Evens

His talk: Preparing for performance, What coaches are doing when not coaching

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Floss Andrews

Her talk: What's behind the game face?

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Dr John Martin

His talk: Tell me what to do!

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Olivia Patel

Her talk: How does nutrition affect performance?

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Christian Wiggin

His talk: Making Things Happen - Successfully Delivering Care as a Team

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Dr Harvey Pynn

His talk: Deploying small medical teams - coping with burnout or boredom

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Dan Davis

His talk: Creating a culture for team performance

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Demonstration of a Resuscitative Thoracotomy

Our trainee Critical Care Doctor, Celestine explains what she enjoyed most about the 2024 Clinical Symposium

I really enjoyed the talk from Floss. I think it's really interesting to think about how we work in teams, and how we can develop ourselves as individual team members to benefit the wider team.

Getting to Ashton Gate

Driving to Ashton Gate

Directions

Bus

Train

Bristol Temple Meads

Parson Street

Cycling