Our theme 
Whai Wāhi: Participation - An Expression of Self.

Seating to Go is proud to be hosting the 5th Oceania Seating Symposium (OSS) in collaboration with Swinburne University of Technology (Australia) and the International Seating Symposium (ISS) at the Rotorua Energy Event Centre, Aotearoa, New Zealand, on the 4th – 6th November 2025.

After an amazing in-person event in Melbourne in 2023, we are excited to once again welcome people to our beautiful country.  November signals the transition between spring and summer and is a wonderful time to combine attending an internationally recognised conference, reconnecting with colleagues and friends from our global community, and exploring the many amazing rohe (regions) of Aotearoa, New Zealand.

Instructional Course Sessions / Workshops

Instructional sessions (including Q&A) will be

• 30 minutes
• 60 minutes or
• 90 minutes 

There will be 4 instructional sessions running concurrently. 

Paper Sessions

Paper presentations will be 15 minutes plus 5 minutes for Q & A. These sessions provide an opportunity for succinct presentations of innovative approaches, research findings or case studies. 

Poster Sessions

Poster sessions will be held during the morning and afternoon meal breaks.  You will need to be by your poster at your appointed session time.  The abstract submission should describe the research or clinical application.

A great abstract is one that is easy to follow and engaging. It should clearly identify the challenge or opportunity explored in the paper and summarise key insights that the paper will contribute to and any interesting questions or ideas that others might explore in the future.

Learning Objectives:

Learning objectives must be written as measurable behavioural objectives that specify what you expect the participant to learn. The hierarchy of behavioural learning is knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation.

Examples:

Upon completion of the session, participants will be able to:

• Describe 3 wheelchair adjustments that improve efficiency for self-propelling
• Compare and contrast 3 different assessment tools for power wheelchair users
• Identify 4 outcome measures of a postural management programme that are relevant for children with cerebral palsy GMFCS Level V.

Abstracts need to be formatted as per below:

• Title: A presentation title, not exceeding 15 words which captures the sessions intent
• Author/presenter information (name, email, country, organisation /affiliation)
• 150 words or less about each author. Please provide relevant biographical information on up to five authors/presenters
• Keywords: Between 5-10 to help classify sessions
• Learning objectives: What are the goals of your presentation? Outline 3 objectives.
• Presentation description: A 300 word summary of the presentation.
• Content references: A minimum of 3 references less than 10 years old, if possible, are required for each session to ensure content is based on the best available evidence related to the topic.
• Presentation type: Paper, poster or instructional sessions/workshops. Instructional sessions and workshops need to indicate length of session preferred – 30, 60 or 90mins.  Proposals for longer sessions (up to 2hrs) must include rationale for the extended time required.
• Presentation level: Beginner – Intermediate or Intermediate – Advanced.
• Biography: Up to 150 words for each author presennting
• Conflict of Interest Disclosure: This includes (but is not limited to) those who work for a manufacturer or supplier, or receive an honorarium or travel expenses from manufacturers or suppliers to speak at the conference.
• All abstracts must be submitted in English
• Must be submitted by 7 April 2025
• Must not be a product / sales presentation

Note: Images, tables, diagrams, graphs cannot be accepted in the abstract submission process

Notifications of abstract acceptance

Authors will be notified whether their abstract has been accepted or declined from 12 May 2025.

(Note: only the primary author per abstract will be contacted. It is their responsibility to notify all contributors)

Publishing of abstracts

Abstracts will be made available on the OSS 2025 website and may be published in the symposium handbook which will be a .pdf version.

(Note: When submitting an abstract for the OSS 2025 the abstract may or may not be published at the discretion of the programe committee. This applies if your abstract is accepted or declined).

All presenters will be required to pay the relevant registration fee to attend OSS 2025. There is a special registration rate available to succesful abstract submitters, this will be advised upon acceptance of your abstract.

Abstract presenters are to meet their own travel and/or accommodation costs.

Please have your abstract body text, your biography and a good quality photo of yourself (ideally 1mb in size) ready to go before you begin the online submission process. You can then copy and paste them into the relevant sumbmission fields.

Upon successful completion of the abstract sumission process, you will be sent an email acknowledging that your abstract has been submitted. If you do not receive an email, please contact the organisers.

Please click the button below to begin the online submission process.

To view the handbook, click the link below.