Heart Rhythm Society Cancels 2020 Meeting Due to COVID-19

While the HRS annual meeting is cancelled, the society has created a resource page to help its members in the fight against COVID-19 at https://www.hrsonline.org/COVID19-Challenges-Solutions. #HRS #COVID19 #coronavirus #SARScov2

While the HRS annual meeting is cancelled, the society has created a resource page to help its members in the fight against COVID-19 at https://www.hrsonline.org/COVID19-Challenges-Solutions

April 1, 2020 — Due to the continued global escalation of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2), the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) has cancelled its large annual electrophysiology meeting that was slated for May 6-9, 2020, in San Diego.

"Our careful evaluation of evolving government advisories, available alternatives, and most importantly the health and well-being of our attendees, the Heart Rhythm Society Board of Trustees regrets to announce that the 2020 Heart Rhythm Scientific Sessions is cancelled," HRS said in a statement sent out this morning.

This is the first time in the history of the society that it has ever cancelled an annual meeting. "The decision to cancel was not an easy one, but it was the right choice during these unprecedented events," HRS stated.

Instead of meeting in person, HRS will offer several new digital programs over the next few months on our online learning platform, Heart Rhythm 365. These programs will be available starting May 6, including the #HRS2020 Abstract E-Poster Catalog, Late-Breaking Clinical Trial sessions, and the Young Investigator Awards session.

The Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) decided to cancel its annual meeting last week. It was also schedule for next month, May 13-16. As virus numbers continue to rise rapidly in both Europe and the U.S., it is widely expected other cardiology and other medical conferences scheduled for May and possibly beyond will follow suit.

The European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA), HIMSS, the American College of Cardiology (ACC), Society of Interventional Radiology (SIR), European Society of Radiology (ECR), and numerous other conferences have been cancelling like dominoes since early March as containment efforts tightened and as hospitals began putting travel restrictions on staff in case they were needed for emergency plans if the number of COVID-19 cases rapidly expanded.

ACC decided the show must go on and hastily created a shorten virtual ACC meeting platform, in which more 38,006 clinicains from 157 countries participated. ACC made the sessions free, and they are accessile on demand for the next 90 days at https://virtual.acc.org/.

ACC and several other medical societies have created COVID-19 resource pages

In its cancellation letter, the HRS thanked the Scientific Sessions Program Committee, faculty, abstract presenters, exhibitors, sponsors, partners, media, and countless others for their commitment to this year's Heart Rhythm Scientific Sessions.