Dr George Cherry

Cover of the programme booklet for the
First EPUAP Open Meeting, in 1997.

9th Annual Meeting, Berlin, Germany, 31 August – 2 September 2006
10th Annual Meeting, Oxford, UK, 30 August – 1 September 2007

ARRANGEMENTS for this year’s Ninth Annual Meeting of the EPUAP, in Berlin, are progressing well and, based on the increased number of abstracts submitted as well as the number of early registrants, it should be one of our best ever meetings. The City of Berlin is full of history and, as stated in one of the guide-books: ‘Berlin offers everything to the visitor and is referred to as New Berlin’. If you can combine your attendance at our meeting with a stay in Berlin before or after the conference I am sure that it will add to the experience of our annual meeting. The scientific programme organised by the programme committee under the chairmanship of Michael Clark with the theme ‘Pressure ulcers – putting knowledge into practice’ will surely add to the quality of previous annual meeting programmes. At this year’s meeting there will be five sponsored symposia, four on Thursday and one on Friday. The support from our commercial exhibitors has again been excellent. The gala dinner (included in the registration fee) takes place on Friday evening, 1st September, at the Berliner Congress Center. Again this will follow the tradition of previous meetings and entertainment and dancing will be part of this event. The reception on Thursday evening will feature local German entertainment and will take place in the commercial exhibition.

At the end of March this year there was a trustees meeting in Amsterdam chaired by our President, Tom Defloor. This meeting was very productive and well attended. It also allowed us to meet our new trustees Jos Schols (The Netherlands), Manuel Gago-Fornells (Spain), Cristina Miguens (Portugal), Lena Gunningberg (Sweden) and Anna Polak (Poland), (see photograph below). A report of this meeting will be given at the annual general meeting on Saturday along with the reports from the working groups.

The new EPUAP Trustees (from left to right):
Jos Schols (The Netherlands), Manuel Gago-Fornells (Spain),
Cristina Miguens (Portugal), Lena Gunningberg (Sweden)
and Anna Polak (Poland).

Trustees Meeting in Amsterdam, 25 March 2006.

In its relatively short history the EPUAP has been extremely successful in the different initiatives that it has undertaken – from the development of the guidelines to the PUCLAS classification. Carol Dealey is liaising with the NPUAP with regard to updating our guidelines in conjunction with the NPUAP in America. If you are interested in being a stakeholder in this initiative please fill in the form on page 58 and return it to the business office. One of the recent initiatives is that of looking in more detail into the role
of shear forces in pressure ulcer development. The first meeting on this topic took place on the final day of last year’s meeting in Aberdeen, with colleagues from the NPUAP and the Japanese Pressure Ulcer Society, and representatives of Industry. Despite being on the last day and at the very end of the meeting it was well attended and since then there have been two follow-up meetings in the USA (in April) at Atlanta and San Antonio. The group appreciates the work of Claudia Abbondati who has acted as the co-ordinator of this initiative and a report written by Michael Clark appears in this issue.
At this year’s Berlin Meeting a summary and update of this initiative will be presented along with a follow-up meeting. Please contact Michael Clark (clarkm@whru.co.uk) concerning details if you are interested in this subject.

Much interest has been shown in the EPUAP’s Science and Practice of Pressure
Ulcer Management. I have been informed by the publisher, Springer-Verlag, that due to this demand the book will be reprinted. Copies can be ordered directly from the EPUAP business office or from the publisher. Lastly, next year’s tenth anniversary meeting will be held in Oxford, England, at the Academic Centre, John Radcliffe Hospital, from 30 August to 1 September. I believe this is rather fitting since our inaugural annual meeting
was also held in Oxford, in 1997. Since then we have had our annual meetings in the Netherlands, Italy, France, Hungary, Finland, Scotland and this year Germany, truly reflecting the EPUAP’s commitment to be a European organisation.

Though the theme has not been finalised for next year’s meeting, I personally believe that the following would be appropriate ‘Ten years of achievements through European co-operation, in understanding and managing pressure ulcers – building on this success in the next decade.’

We look forward to seeing you in Germany.

Dr George W. Cherry
Secretary / Treasurer