{"id":13762,"date":"2011-11-15T09:42:16","date_gmt":"2011-11-15T14:42:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/?post_type=fellowship-training&p=13762"},"modified":"2011-11-15T09:42:16","modified_gmt":"2011-11-15T14:42:16","slug":"my-first-oral-presentation-life-on-the-other-side-of-the-podium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/2011\/11\/15\/my-first-oral-presentation-life-on-the-other-side-of-the-podium\/","title":{"rendered":"My First Oral Presentation: Life on the Other Side of the Podium"},"content":{"rendered":"

Several Cardiology Fellows who are attending AHA.11 this week are blogging together on CardioExchange.\u00a0 The Fellows include\u00a0Revathi Balakrishnan<\/a>,<\/a> Eiman Jahangir<\/a>, John Ryan<\/a> (moderator), and Amit Shah<\/a>. Read the previous post here<\/a>. Check back often to learn about the biggest buzz in Orlando.<\/em><\/p>\n

My experiences of AHA conferences have been a progression, as they probably have been for others as well. It started with coming just for the experience; no presentations, just pure learning with my eyes wide open. What fun! The next AHA, I had the privilege of presenting a poster. While it was an honor to be selected for it, I felt some frustration because of the limited attendance and vast competition from other sessions and exhibits. At times I felt as if I was standing alone, handcuffed to my poster! This time, I timidly came to AHA with the opportunity to present my abstract in an oral session.\u00a0 It was a refreshing change from a poster and an honor, but definitely a challenge as well.<\/p>\n

It was a blessing and a curse. I loved not having to drag around a huge poster container, but I felt that I was dragging around my dread instead. What if I mess up my slides? I found myself tweaking them at the last minute, and missing sessions just to practice. Why did I sign up for this? Thoughts were racing as I became tachycardic in anticipation. Deep breaths\u2026<\/p>\n

The talk went\u2026well, it just went. I never became completely comfortable, and found myself talking too fast several times. I felt like a mechanical speaking robot, reading off my slides at the speed of sound with little inflection or emotion.<\/p>\n

Before I knew it, the talk ended. On to questions! Two were asked. They were really insightful, actually, but my brain was still not working. Although I did my best to answer the questions, I felt like a politician; it sounded like I was answering, but I didn\u2019t really<\/em> answer the question completely to the satisfaction of the audience.<\/p>\n

Afterwards, I ran into some friends, which was a breath of fresh air; they were all very encouraging. Overall, I valued the experienced, learned a lot, and would do it again in a heartbeat, even though I know I’ll be nervous again.\u00a0 Hopefully I will be a little bit less tachycardic at least.<\/p>\n

Does anyone else have stories to share about their first experience given an oral presentation? Perhaps any tips?<\/p>\n

[EDITOR’S NOTE: for more on the experience of presenting at for the first time see John Ryan’s post from last year’s AHA<\/a> and his interview earlier this month with Thomas Ryan<\/a>].<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not having to drag around a poster container was refreshing, but instead I found myself dragging around my dread about my oral presentation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":286,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1036,195,1043],"class_list":["post-13762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-aha-scientific-sessions","tag-fellowship-training-2","tag-presenting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/286"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13762\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}