The recent AWO Safety & Sustainability Conference in Chicago brought together US leaders from across the brown water sector for a candid discussion on where our industry stands today and where it must go next.

VIKAND was proud to contribute to this conversation by presenting on Crew Asset Management. Our message was simple but resonant: healthcare at sea must shift from reactive to proactive, predictive care. Rather than wait for problems to arise and escalate, we now have tools to preserve health, protect safety and improve retention while reducing costly downtime.

What stood out most was the openness of the dialogue – practical, safety-driven and focused squarely on the wellbeing of crew members. The session drew strong engagement, particularly around how technology is changing what’s possible. Satellite connectivity, cloud workflows and mobile apps can now make participation seamless.

Tools such as our VIKAND Crew Wellness Pulse Check resonated with many attendees, as it offers seafarers an anonymous way to share concerns while giving shoreside teams visibility into fatigue, stress and emerging health risks. AI-driven insights take this one step further, allowing operators to detect patterns across fleets and intervene before risks turn into incidents.

Conversations during and after the session reinforced that mental health is now seen as essential to safe operations, not a peripheral issue. Stakeholders expressed a clear desire for easy-to-use, private and actionable solutions to challenges such as stress and fatigue.

Another emerging theme was the need to act now rather than wait for regulations to catch up. Forward-looking operators are already adopting practical solutions that support crews, which aligns with the heart of our Crew Asset Management philosophy – treating seafarers as core assets and investing in their health the way we would any other critical system on board.

The overall takeaway from Chicago was clear: the maritime industry is ready for scalable approaches that strengthen safety and help retain experienced mariners. By proactively addressing physical and mental health, we can move toward a future where safety, performance and crew wellbeing are inseparable.

In this edition of Pulse, explore the downsides of toxic resilience among seafarers, learn how telehealth proved invaluable in our latest case study, see the dramatic impact of air purification in onboard smoking areas and more.