NCP is an esteemed international scientific psychiatric congress, organised every third year in a Nordic or a Baltic country.

The programme on June 17-18, 2021 consisted of the highest quality scientific presentations by some of the leading professional in psychiatry, for example, Dan Chisholm, the Programme Manager for Mental Health at the WHO Regional Office for Europe with his plenary lecture ‘Public mental health needs and responses in the context of COVID-19: a blueprint for the future?’.

A Helsinki-based PCO, Confedent International, managed all practical arrangements and registration, and helped the organisers transform the congress to a virtual event amidst the pandemic.

The theme of the congress ‘connecting minds’ was now timelier than ever, bringing together people from 14 different countries and 3 continents around the world. NCP2021 was organised on ProspectumLIVE livestreaming platform. The main program stream had full program for both congress days and two other parallel livestreams were organised for the symposia and oral presentations twice per day in two-hour sessions. Since all speakers and chairpersons participated in the congress remotely, their presentations were captured to ProspectumLIVE through Microsoft Teams.

Certain plenary and oral presentations had also been pre-recorded and they were livestreamed as pre-recorded video presentations during the sessions. Poster presentations were available for viewing and they also had pre-recorded 3-minute videos embedded on the ProspectumLIVE platform. All content will remain on the platform for 30 days and a ‘post congress registration’ has been enabled for those who could not join the livestream.

Virtual tours in Finland were also provided through the platform. The Nordic and Baltic psychiatric associations had also been encouraged to send virtual video greetings, which were available for the participants during the breaks. Exhibitors and sponsors had virtual exhibition spaces where they provided information on their products and services.

The congress participants had a possibility to interact, comment and ask questions from the speakers through one-to-all Chat in each scientific session. Additionally, one-to-one chat and video call options were available for networking of participants and exhibitors.

Despite the participants not being able to visit Finland this time around, NCP2021 managed to showcase Finnish hospitality through a warm welcoming ceremony and an array of video clips transporting viewers into the Finnish wilderness and unique culture. The feedback received from all parties involved has been predominantly positive.