FollowUs ERA-EDTA Newsletter 1


The official ERA-EDTA Newsletter - Year 1 Issue 1

President

Francesco Locatelli, Italy

Secretary-Treasurer

Jorge B. Cannata-Andía, Spain

Chief-Controller

Luis Piera, Spain

Editor-in-Chief of “Nephrology

Dialysis Transplantation”

Tilman Drüeke, France

Chairman of the Registry

Editor-in-Chief of “NDT-Educational”

Carmine Zoccali, Italy

Chairman

of the Paper Selection Committee

David Goldsmith, UK

Ordinary Council Members

Ali Basci, Turkey

Adrian Covic, Romania

Kai-Uwe Eckardt, Germany

Gérard London, France

Iain Macdougall, UK

Klaus Olgaard, Denmark

Dimitrios Tsakiris, Greece

President of the XLII Congress

Kamil Serdengeçti, Turkey

Chairman of the Scientific Committee

of the XLII Congress

Jürgen Floege, Germany

Chairperson of the European Council for Accreditation

in CME in Nephrology,

Dialysis and Transplantation

Rosanna Coppo, Italy

Editor-in-Chief of “Follow us”

Adrian Covic, Romania

Co-Editor of “Follow us”

Dimitrios Tsakiris, Greece

ERA-EDTA website

www.era-edta.org

XLII Congress website

www.eraedta2005.org

NDT-Educational website

www.ndt-educational.org

ERA-EDTA Registry website

www.era-edta-reg.org


Follow us The official ERA-EDTA Newsletter followus@era-edta.org www.era-edta.org/followus.htm
Editor-in-Chief: Adrian Covic Co-Editor: Dimitrios Tsakiris Managing Editor: Silvia Menoni Managing Co-Editor: Virna Pierobon Graphic design: PierLuigi Franchi
ERA-EDTA c/o ERA-EDTA Congress Office Via Spolverini 2 43100 Parma - Italy

We are Moving Ahead

An interview to Prof. Francesco Locatelli, ERA-EDTA President

Prof. Locatelli, your term as ERA-EDTA President is expiring this June, have you made a balance of these three years?

Of course, who wouldn't? I must say that I was very lucky since the balance is very positive: the number of members is steady, attendance at the annual congresses has been increasing, the journal is doing very well with the impact-factor and is receiving more and more papers, the educational courses have become more numerous and are held in more countries than before, the new Registry has proved to be an efficient structure, producing interesting and useful results, new European Best Practice Guidelines have been published. In other words, all those things that our Association was already doing have been going on very well, and to this we have made additions: the new online journal NDT-Educational, establishing a Research Fund, a general comprehensive frame for the courses, a congress together with ISN, an agreement with ASN to organise sessions at the respective annual congresses, and modifying the Constitution of ERA-EDTA in order to include the new initiatives. Of course I cannot take credit for all these things, considering the amount of work and ideas that were put in by the members of the Council and by many other members outside the Council, but I feel proud for having given my contribution.

Prof. Francesco Locatelli opening the XLI ERAEDTA Congress last year in Lisbon

An Exciting New Congress

Istanbul 2005 highlights

This year's congress of the ERA-EDTA in Istanbul faces a number of exciting new features in the congress programme. In addition to the well established symposia dealing in depth with a particular problem as well as the well established free communication and poster sessions, we will have a number of ”mini-lectures” that will aim at introducing or summarising a particular topic in the free communications sessions. We thereby hope to provide a better basis for the audience to get acquainted with some topics where important developments are taking place.

CME Courses in 2005

The first experimental year of our European ERA-EDTA CME Courses demonstrated how important they are for continuing information and education in Nephrology, while increasing the scientific effectiveness of our Society. Most of the participants were young persons eager to receive educational training difficult to find in their Country as well as Nephrologists wishing to receive a deeper insight into new up-to-date fields.

Our Investments for the Future

From Professor J.B. Cannata-Andía

After more than 2 years as Secretary-Treasurer of the ERA-EDTA, what do you think that the main achievements have been?

Our membership has increased greatly; as a consequence of this there has also been a growth in aims and projects. In two years, the number of training and educational courses has tripled.
The budget allocated by the ERA-EDTA Council to support the CME courses acounts to 160.000 Euros. We have also increased the number of grants (more than 60) awarded to our young nephrologists.

Prof. Jorge B. Cannata-Andía

The ERA-EDTA Offices

A truly European Society

It takes people from all over Europe to make a European association, and people all over Europe carry out the activities of ERA-EDTA.
As for most societies, the Secretary-Treasurer plays a key-role and needs the help of a good assistant. Jorge B. Cannata-Andía has held this position for more than two years, and in his office in Oviedo he has been helped by Francesca Pieraccini to accomplish his complex and various duties.


News from the ERA-EDTA Council This year three new officers (President, Secretary-Treasurer and Chief-Controller) were nominated by the Council. After receiving the applications the Council nominated the candidates and a secret ballot among the members of the Council nominated: Prof. Jorge Cannata-Andia (Spain) as President, Prof. Adrian Covic (Romania) as Secretary-Treasurer, and Prof. Rosanna Coppo (Italy) as Chief-Controller. The term of the new officers will start in June 2005, after the Congress in Istanbul, and we are confident that they will keep moving our Society ahead. Congratulations to all of them!
By the end of June 2005 the Editorial Office of our journal “Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation” will move from Paris to Ghent. In fact, Prof. T. Drueke’s term is expiring and the new Editor-in-Chief will be Prof. N. Lameire. Prof. Drueke over the past 6 years did a tremendous job and has managed to improve the quality of NDT with an impact factor standing at 2.63 at the end of 2004. The overall manuscript submissions increase progressively 20% from 2002 to 2004. The changeover of the Editorial Office is running smoothly and we are sure that the good work will be continued under the skilful guidance of Prof. Lameire.
Also this year, the ERA-EDTA Council has decided to award 60 Congress Grants at the Istanbul Congress to the Presenting Authors of the best abstracts under the age of 40 by December 31, 2005. The Congress Grants will be equally distributed in four groups: Basic Sciences, Clinical Nephrology, Dialysis and Transplantation. All winners will receive free Congress registration, a cheque for 400.00 Euros, except for the Presenting Authors of the two best abstracts of each category (total number 8), whose cheque will be of 800.00 Euros. The Presenting Authors of the two best abstracts of each category will also receive a diploma.


	The Lady and the Rose, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, The Mackintosh House, Hunterian Museum & Art Gallery, University of Glasgow, Photograph © Colin Baxter