NEWSLETTER

Dear Colleagues

At the time of writing there are only two months for the remaining organisational tasks which will ensure a successful annual meeting in Glasgow in September. The most recent of these tasks has been the selection of abstracts for the scientific meeting.

This year the Programme Committee and its assistants have been faced with a record number of abstracts. There has also been further improvement in the scientific standard of these abstracts. The large number of submissions means that only about a quarter can be accepted. Inevitably, many deserving papers cannot be accommodated and some of you will be disappointed. We have increased the time available for the presentations at this year’s meeting to reflect the high quality of the abstracts, and I anticipate an excellent meeting with a wide range of interest.

This year was the first time that electronic submission of abstracts has been used. It has been very successful. The majority of abstracts were submitted electronically, displaying a high level of computer-literacy of our members (or their secretaries!).

During this past year I have been asked many questions about our practice and our specialty. Some are related to resource requirements, some to organisation, and some to surgical performance and outcome. In attempting to answer these questions I, in common with others facing similar questions, am constantly in need of accurate and up-to-date information. It is therefore a particular pleasure to see the progress that has been made with the ECSUR project. This reflects the work of our Database Committee which is collecting information on adult cardiac, paediatric cardiac, and thoracic surgery. An account of these activities, in which very many of you have collaborated, will be given at the September Annual meeting. This effort will surely pay dividends in the future, with accurate documentation of cardio-thoracic surgical practice in Europe.

At the meeting of the American Association of Thoracic Surgeons in New Orleans in April I had the pleasure of signing an agreement on behalf of EACTS for collaboration with the AATS and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons in the CTSNet. This is a very promising tool for making professional information readily available to cardio-thoracic surgeons world-wide. Again, delegates will have access to these developments at the September meeting.

It is therefore with considerable confidence that I look forward to a memorable meeting in Glasgow in September and hope to see you there.

David J Wheatley, MD
President EACTS

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The Newsletter has undergone a change, hopefully to the better. The background has been the realisation that everybody nowadays is overwhelmed with information competing for your attention. The changes are geared to make it easy for you to find material of interest for you. The changes include an index and a short summary. By reading these features only you will be informed by the important facts in the Newsletter.

1077 abstracts were sent in for the Programme Committee to grade and select. As this is considerably more than last year, the selection process had to be revised in order not to overburden the members of the Programme Committee. A number of members, mainly from the Editorial Board of EJCTS, were asked to participate in the grading of the first round. Our special thanks goes to O. Alfieri, M. Antunes, J. Bachet, F. Beyersdorf , M Elliott, D. Loisance, J. Pomar, K. Taylor, and L. von Segesser. By this measure, the number of categories to be judged by each Programme Committee member was reduced. The grading was done electronically (which incidentally decreased both time requirements and costs). A cut-off point of the 40 % abstracts with the best grades was determined. These abstracts were sent to the members of the Programme Committee for the second round.

Faced with the fact that that the number of abstracts submitted has increased markedly over the last three years since we introduced the four parallel sessions, the Council deliberated how to be able to accept for presentation more of the excellent work submitted. The decision was that around 80 more presentation slots could be accommodated by starting earlier in the morning and continue into Wednesday afternoon as well as some other minor changes. By this measure, the EACTS for the Glasgow Meeting has an acceptance rate of 25%.

Electronic abstract submission was introduced this year using software developed by CTSNet and Peter Greene. Of the abstracts submitted, 70 % was via electronic means and 30 % by ordinary mail. The electronic submission had some problems with it. Among other things, duplicate submissions were fairly often seen and were weeded out. On the whole, however, handling abstracts via the Internet turned out to be a great success, saving time, effort and cost. The procedure will be further refined for next year. However, we will for the next years accept also abstracts on paper.

For some time now, the ownership and governing of the CTSNet Inc. has been deliberated. Originally an initiative of the STS, spearheaded by Robert L. Replogle and Peter Greene and ardently supported by the EACTS (Paul Sergeant) and later by the AATS, the CTSNet was devised to be a truly international endeavour. The basic idea is to cover the needs of the cardio-thoracic surgeon, primarily from a professional point of view but also in other ways.

During the recent AATS meeting in New Orleans the following developments occurred. CTSNet is now a company, owned jointly by STS, EACTS and AATS. It has a Board of nine Governors who are appointed by the owning associations. The Board appoints an Executive Editor (Peter Greene). By owning the company we are independent and can create our own future. As you know, the development within the CTSNet and our Homepages have been phenomenal. This development will now increase in pace and purpose. Cardio-thoracic surgery is very well advanced in the use of the Internet. We are probably the medical speciality which has the best and most comprehensive means of service via the net. By using the well established programming ability of the core CTSNet staff we will be able to further improve on these services.

All members of the Associations have automatic access to (most of) the restricted pages of the CTSNet.

Our Executive Secretariat in London has for the last 7 years been with CASIL. During the last years several changes have been undertaken in the inner structure of CASIL. It is now no longer the company that we originally sought services from. Furthermore, times have changed in also other ways. The impact of the new communication media is so great that restructuring of the services which we give our members, visitors of the Annual Meetings, and especially our partners from the medical industry have to be re-thought from a very basic level.

The EACTS is now a fairly large economic entity. One of our commitments must be to use our combined resources in the most cost-effective way. Analysing advantages and disadvantages of engaging and getting service from a company as opposed to doing the job ourselves with employed personnel and some specialised consultants, the Council has come to the decision that we should take our fate in our own hands. The Association will thus establish an office in London.

From this core office we will continue to develop the activities of the Association. This will mean a need for a further commitment from the officers of the Association, but also a higher level of freedom to act.

The Association is growing rapidly. The Membership Committee has approved 221 New applications. Out of these 140 apply for Active or International membership. 81 residents have applied for Junior membership. The names of these applicants are attached with this Newsletter for your information and approval pending the election of new members at the General Assembly.

During the recent Council Meeting it was decided to establish tow new infrastructure features, Discussion and Working Groups. Working Groups are small groups within an association who have the task to help with and to develop a certain small or large subject within the speciality. The European Society of Cardiology has used Working Groups quite successfully. In order to make full use of the Internet, the Council decided that there should be a link on our Homepage to Discussion and Working Groups. Initiatives about the number and subjects of Discussion and Working Groups should come from the members themselves.

The intention of creating Discussion and Working Groups as one of the infrastructure features of the EACTS are the following:

There should be a structure within the EACTS by which members with similar interests may get to know each other, communicate, take initiatives and thus promote their Discussion or Working Group subject.

Within a Discussion or Working Group, there may be several activities such as simple information exchange, scientific initiatives, multi-centre studies, state-of-the-art declarations, post-graduate education etc. Thus the role of the Discussion and Working Groups will to large extent depend upon the members of the Groups themselves. Discussion Groups do not need any formal approval of the Council. A Discussion Group may apply to the Council to become the Working Group of the EACTS of that specific topic.

The activities of the Discussion and Working Groups will be monitored by the number of visits to the specific Group Site. If the activities within the Groups are successful, the Group may apply for or be asked to be the official Group of the EACTS in that subject. The Council may then ask one or several members to act as liaison member(s) of the Working Group. The activities of the Groups take place on the Internet. There is no budget for travels etc. Scientific or postgraduate initiatives have to be separately financed. The EACTS may provide for a meeting room during the Annual Meeting if required.

The EACTS IT Officer has the duty to oversee that the EACTS Homepage is not abused. If a Group behaves un-ethically or otherwise offensively, the Council –and indeed also the CTSNet Editor- reserves the right of disbanding the Group Site and the Group itself.

The Council hopes, that the creation of Discussion and Working Groups and the facilities put at their disposal will lead to scientific and educational development. Working Groups with official status will be used as advisors to the Council and be asked to assist in work of the Association such as the preparation of state-of-the-art documents of various kinds.