• Understand the national priorities driving elective recovery and how they translate into local surgical transformation

• Explore best practice examples of how NHS trusts are improving patient flow, productivity, and theatre efficiency

• Identify opportunities for collaboration between surgical teams, ICSs, and national programmes to accelerate recovery

• Explore how integrated perioperative care pathways can improve surgical outcomes, patient safety, and recovery times

• Understand the role of prehabilitation, early assessment, and optimisation of comorbidities in reducing cancellations and complications

• Discuss how multidisciplinary collaboration between surgical, anaesthetic, and primary care teams can drive consistent, high-quality perioperative practice across the NHS

This panel will bring together surgical innovators, clinicians, and technology leaders to explore how robotics, artificial intelligence, and digital tools are transforming surgical practice. Panellists will discuss how innovation can be scaled safely and equitably across the NHS, sharing real-world experiences of digital adoption, the challenges of workforce training, and the opportunities for improving patient outcomes through smarter surgery.

This panel will bring together senior clinicians, educators, and policymakers to discuss how the NHS can build and sustain a skilled, resilient, and motivated surgical workforce. Panellists will explore training innovation, wellbeing support, and workforce planning for the future.

• Understand how surgical teams can contribute to the NHS Net Zero ambitions through greener clinical practice

• Explore sustainable innovations in surgical equipment, anaesthetics, and waste reduction

• Identify practical steps for embedding sustainability principles across perioperative pathways

• Identify how surgical systems can be redesigned to streamline patient flow and theatre efficiency

• Learn how environment design, digital integration, and workforce planning impact surgical safety and experience

• Explore the role of leadership and culture in sustaining high-quality surgical services

• Learn how the DrEaMing (Drinking, Eating, and Mobilising) initiative is transforming recovery after surgery

• Explore evidence showing how early mobilisation and nutrition reduce complications and hospital stays

• Understand how to embed DrEaMing principles into perioperative pathways at scale across the NHS