METHOD: This was a qualitative study using brief, semi-structured, face-to-face interviews amongst delegates at a 3-day Asia Pacific regional academic primary care conference in Singapore. Interviews were digitally recorded, transcribed verbatim, and their contents analysed thematically.

RESULTS: Eighty-nine interviews were analysed. Respondents were mainly early career researchers (58%), and a third were presenting (poster or oral) at the conference. Many positive attributes of posters were identified. For the viewers, these included the ability to gain a rapid overview of research activity (for "benchmarking", "updating", and "inspiration"); the ability to choose who to engage with and when, in contrast to the tightly scheduled oral sessions; and opportunity to discuss content in a leisurely and detailed fashion with the presenter. Presenters considered posters "less threatening" than oral presentations and valued posters for the networking opportunities they created. However, posters were reported to be more demanding on the skills of précis and their preparation was considered arduous and more expensive than an oral presentation. Posters were also perceived to have lower academic status and dominate the presenter's time at the conference, reducing the opportunities for them to see the work of others. Suggestions for incorporating technologies to enhance the impact of posters included QR codes to access more detailed information, pre-recorded presentations, and online interactive clarification sessions with poster authors.

CONCLUSION: Posters are perceived as a valuable mode of presentation at scientific conferences by presenters and viewers. Their unique strengths challenge the perception that posters are somehow inferior to oral presentations, suggesting a need for their advantages to be promoted by researchers and conference organisers. The incorporation of technology within the traditional display may enhance poster utility. Given the time and money spent on academic conferences there is an urgent need to evaluate the different styles of presentation used at conferences and how they differ in their ability to impact on medical science knowledge and evidence-based clinical practice.

METHODS: Injury mortality was estimated using the GBD mortality database, corrections for garbage coding and CODEm-the cause of death ensemble modelling tool. Morbidity estimation was based on surveys and inpatient and outpatient data sets for 30 cause-of-injury with 47 nature-of-injury categories each. The Socio-demographic Index (SDI) is a composite indicator that includes lagged income per capita, average educational attainment over age 15 years and total fertility rate.

RESULTS: For many causes of injury, age-standardised DALY rates declined with increasing SDI, although road injury, interpersonal violence and self-harm did not follow this pattern. Particularly for self-harm opposing patterns were observed in regions with similar SDI levels. For road injuries, this effect was less pronounced.