Student Conference – Bookings Open

The day is aimed at all students and foundation doctors with an interest in medical ethics.  This year our conference is focused on ‘Out of Sight, Out of Care: The Ethics of Including the Excluded in Healthcare’. We will be showcasing your work in medical ethics through oral and poster presentations.

Our workshops and oral presentations will cover a breadth of ethical topics, from prison-based healthcare to paediatrics to the ethics of caring for carers. You’ll be able to choose between three workshops to attend in the morning session and three in the afternoon.

Bookings are now open here

Keynote Speakers – Prof Emma Plugge & Dr Annabel Sowemimo

Prof Emma Plugge

Emma Plugge is Professor of Public Health at the University of Southampton in the UK. She is a medical doctor who, having worked clinically in the UK and overseas, trained in public health. She now works as a researcher, focusing on the health of marginalised populations. She has a particular interest in the health of imprisoned people, especially that of women and their children. She is currently involved in a number of research studies examining health in prisons, including examining the impact of climate change on imprisoned people in the UK and in Ghana. She is also leading the evaluation of the health and social impact of the first community-based alternative to imprisonment for women in England.​

She is an advocate for capacity building to ensure more research in prisons globally and played a key role in the establishment of the Worldwide Prison Health Research & Engagement Network (WEPHREN). This is an ‘open access collaborative forum for everyone interested in prison health globally, aiming to improve the health of people in prison through the equitable development of the evidence base and through capacity building initiatives for health’. This work revealed a parlous lack on guidance for researchers on the ethical conduct of research in prisons and led to a recently completed international collaborative project developing such guidance, involving over 50 people from over 20 countries.

Dr Annabel Sowemimo

Dr Annabel Sowemimo is a doctor, academic, activist and writer. She is an NHS Consultant in Sexual & Reproductive Health working in South London. She founded the charity the Reproductive Justice Initiative (RJI, formerly Decolonising Contraception), which aims to address health inequalities and racial disparities. RJI has been shortlisted for numerous awards, winning grassroots organisation of the year at the Sexual Health Awards in 2020 and a National LGBTQ Health Advisor award in 2022. ​

In 2023, Annabel received an outstanding achievement award from the British Association of Sexual Health and HIV (BASHH). Within her specialty, she is interested in tackling Gender Based Violence and improving access to healthcare for marginalised groups. She firmly believes that healthcare should be about empowering people with knowledge to make informed choices about their bodies. ​

Annabel published her first book Divided: Racism, Medicine and Why We Need to Decolonise Healthcare with the Wellcome Collection in April 2023. It won the Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing and a Breast Cancer Book of the Year award. It was also shortlisted for the Orwell Prize for Political Non-Fiction, the British Academy Book Prize for Cultural Understanding and an Indie Champion’s Award. ​

Annabel spends her spare time campaigning on reproductive justice, against NHS cuts and improving healthcare for marginalised groups. She became a mum for the first time to a baby boy who arrived on her birthday in June 2024. ​

Programme

A £10 deposit is required to book your place at the conference, however the deposit will be returned on attendance, making this a FREE conference!

You may be eligible for an IME Conference Grant to cover your travel costs.

Check criteria HERE.

Location: The Wesley Hotel, 81-103 Euston St., London NW1 2EZ

Date: Saturday 7th February 2026

The IME are also holding a FREE to attend public lecture on the evening before the Student Conference entitled Challenging Narratives; My experience of medicine and disability. Find out more here