ISAH 2026 comes to Sydney: what's actually on the program

The 17th International Subarachnoid Haemorrhage Conference runs 17–20 November 2026 at the Sheraton Grand Sydney Hyde Park. It is the only global meeting devoted entirely to aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage, and this is the first time it has been held in the southern hemisphere.

Previous meetings in Amsterdam and at Duke drew more than 350 delegates from over 15 countries. Sydney brings together the people who actually shape SAH care – neurocritical care, neurointervention, cerebrovascular neurosurgery, neurology, neuroanaesthesia, rehabilitation, translational science and people with lived experience of SAH – for a workshop day and three days of main program.

Why this meeting

Most SAH content lives as a session or two inside larger stroke, neurosurgery or critical care meetings. ISAH is the one place where the whole field is in the room at once and the entire program is about the disease.

ISAH 2026 has been built to define the next decade of aneurysm and SAH care rather than summarise the last one. The program opens with a proposal to form a global alliance in aneurysm care and closes by asking delegates to endorse it. In between: the trials that failed and why, the guidelines from both sides of the Atlantic put under the microscope, the registries that are quietly changing practice, and the mechanisms that might finally give us something to treat.

Tuesday 17 November – Workshop day

Five small-group workshops, each built so one discipline can see inside another's:

NeuroResus Essentials (half day, Oliver Flower). Aneurysmal SAH, malignant MCA infarction, raised ICP and the pharmacology to manage them – condensed from the full NeuroResus course.

Neuroanaesthesia 101 (half day, Andy Lindberg). Three sessions for the anaesthetist who wants to be ready for the hardest case on the list: a simulated cardiac arrest mid-SAH case, a side-by-side TCI showdown (Eleveld vs Schnider vs Minto), and EEG as a real-time monitor in SAH.

Vascular Neurosurgery for the Non-Surgeon (half day, Keryn Davidson, Andrew Gauden, Jordan Jones and Rumal Jayalath). What is actually being weighed up in theatre when a ruptured aneurysm is clipped, with hands-on stations on a microscope aneurysm model and EVD placement.

Neurointervention and Neurovascular Imaging for the Non-Interventionalist (half day, Alice Ma and Jaime Drummond). The imaging that drives decisions and the procedural considerations that matter to ICU and theatre teams.

Core Outcomes for Subarachnoid Haemorrhage: Multidisciplinary Consensus Workshop (full day, Shane English and Chris Andersen). A formal OMERACT-methodology consensus process, with lived-experience participants, researchers and clinicians in the same room, to decide which measurement instruments every future aSAH study should report. The output will be submitted for publication.

Industry-supported hands-on device sessions also run during breakouts across the main program.

Wednesday 18 November – Past, present and future of SAH care

The opening morning sets the frame. Philip Talbot on the forgotten survivors and what lived-experience collaboration should look like. Nima Etminan on the road from vasospasm to where the field is heading. Seana Gall on the changing epidemiology of aSAH in Australia and New Zealand. Emanuela Keller on precision medicine and augmented intelligence in acute aSAH. Jose Suarez on international collaboration. Mervyn Vergouwen leads a debate on whether we need a new consensus definition of deterioration. Then Oliver Flower and Chris Andersen table the alliance proposal.

The afternoon turns to unruptured aneurysms: Vergouwen on PHASES 2.0 and the future of rupture prediction, Ronil Chandra on dynamic risk and competing outcomes, Edgar Samaniego on wall enhancement and imaging biomarkers, and a case-based multidisciplinary panel moderated by Leon Lai on the difficult decisions in unruptured aneurysm care.

Breakouts run across three streams all day: rapid-fire selected abstracts, surgical decision-making (treat tonight or wait until morning, drain first or not, when treatment is futile), and clip-versus-coil case debates on MCA, ACoA and posterior circulation aneurysms.

Welcome reception from 17:00.

Thursday 19 November – Securement, vasospasm and DCI

David Bervini opens with multicentre registry findings on angiogram-negative SAH, followed by John Laidlaw on timing of aneurysm securement, Julian Maingard on CT perfusion for DCI, Sherif Mahmoud on precision prescribing, and Sokchan Sim on clipping aneurysms with a remodelled ophthalmic microscope in a low-resource setting.

Mid-morning is the American Stroke Association × ISAH 2026 guidelines session: Etminan on what changed in the 2026 ESO/EANS/ESMINT guideline, Nerissa Ko on the evidence gaps behind the 2023 AHA/ASA guideline, and a panel putting both under the microscope.

The afternoon plenary goes to mechanism: Hemant Bhagat on neuroanaesthesia and DCI, Isabel Hostettler on early brain injury, Alex Choi on the adaptive immune system and DCI, and Jens Dreier on cortical spreading depolarisations and multimodal monitoring. Stefan Wolf and Amal Abou-Hamden debate whether lumbar drainage should be used more widely, and Loch Macdonald leads a panel on the most promising treatments on the horizon for DCI.

Breakouts cover animal models, advanced endovascular strategies (intrasaccular devices, surface-modified flow diverters, paediatric aneurysms, stentplasty for refractory vasospasm), surgical rescue after aSAH, haemodynamic escalation in ICU, and the future of global neurointerventional access including the China experience and robotic neurointervention.

Conference dinner from 18:30.

Friday 20 November – Trials, registries and ISAH Futures

Registries first: Dominique Cadilhac on lessons from AusCR, national registry experience from Australia, Switzerland and Denmark, and Jose Suarez on NIH common data elements and international research networks. Craig Anderson and Nerissa Ko then debate whether adaptive, platform and registry-based trials are the future or a false dawn.

Shane English asks why so many aSAH trials have failed. Carolina Maciel and Katharina Busl argue for moving beyond single-mechanism trials. Ben Gaastra covers GWAS and proteomics as the route to the next target. Spiros Blackburn presents PILLAR XT results. A panel then sets the top ten research priorities for aneurysm care 2027–2032, informed by a survey of every ISAH delegate during the meeting.

The final session, ISAH Futures, brings in the foundations (Brain Aneurysm Foundation, Stroke Foundation, SameYou), reports back from the core outcome working groups, rethinks recovery beyond the mRS, and puts the five big questions in aneurysm innovation to a panel moderated by Ronil Chandra. The meeting closes with the formal proposal for a global alliance in aneurysm care, seeking endorsement from the room.

The International Steering Group

The program has been shaped by an International Steering Group of more than 30 senior clinicians and researchers across regions and disciplines, most of whom are speaking, chairing or debating. Full list at subarachnoid.org/isg.

Who should come

Intensivists, neurosurgeons, interventional neuroradiologists, neurologists, anaesthetists, nurses, allied health, rehabilitation clinicians, trialists, basic scientists, trainees and people with lived experience of SAH. Discounted registration is available for doctors in training, nurses, allied health, researchers, students and lived-experience delegates.

Register

Registration is open at subarachnoid.org/register. Workshop places are limited and sold separately. Full program at subarachnoid.org.

ISAH 2026 is endorsed by the Neurocritical Care Society.

Questions to the conference secretariat: isah@theassociationspecialists.com.au