Letter of the president

Dear colleagues,

After a successful and exciting congress in Paris, I had the great honour to take over the presidency from Hans Brölmann who has guided our society into a new era of its history.

The European Society for Gynaecological Endoscopy (ESGE) is growing exponentially, and with the current membership of 3,429, we have beaten all historical records. Congratulations to you all, but, as they say, ‘noblesse oblige’. Indeed, it is now a major challenge to establish a professional communication between all of us. If we want to benefit from each others’ capacities and improve our common standards, we have to exchange our experience and knowledge and become a true family, allied by common scientific, educational and quality control projects. Let us bring the national know-how to a European level so that we can all share it. The ESGE corporate membership policy is certainly serving this objective and I am inviting all BSGE, AGE, WGE, SEGI and MESGE members to participate actively in the ESGE projects.

Probably the most important communication in this context is provided by our journal: Gynaecological Surgery. In this regard, I want to thank personally Prof. Ivo Brosens, who is at the end of his term, for the tremendous efforts he made to bring the journal to its current high standard.

His function will be taken over by Prof. Jan Deprest from Belgium, renowned for his work in the field of perinatal medicine and urogynaecology. We are very confident that Prof. Deprest will continue to raise our journal to become the most interesting one in the field of gynaecological surgery.

The ESGE aims to be a European engine, designing an innovative, scientifically validated training and certification programme in gynaecological endoscopic surgery. The approach to validate on one hand the skills for the laparoscopic dimension and on the other hand the surgical skills is unique. Even more important is the recognition of the different learning characteristics of those skills and their implementation as such in an integrated training and testing programme. Depending on the skill level of the laparoscopic dimension, the individual receives access to different surgical learning programmes. Finally, the ESGE defines three levels of gynaecological laparoscopic surgery: the bachelor in laparoscopy, the laparoscopic gynaecological surgeon and the endoscopic pelvic surgeon (www.ESGE.org).

The Winners Project on the other hand is a new e-learning programme fully supported by the ESGE, aiming to give everybody access to a complete teaching programme in laparoscopy and hysteroscopy, according to the ESGE levels of surgical skills (www.winnersproject.com).

The breaking news is that the ESGE is taking the organisation of the annual congress into its own hands. An ‘ad hoc’ department has been installed at the central office and the scientific coordinator, Prof. A. Wattiez, will hold office for the next three congresses. It is our ambition to diversify the scientific programme and to find the best possible connection between science and real everyday needs.

The Berlin congress preparation is already very advanced and we are very proud that we can count on the valuable endorsement of the German gynaecological communities and the German Academy of young residents that will confidently lead to an extraordinary participation, thus offering a unique opportunity to residents and gynaecologists from all over the world to meet in Berlin, October 16th–19th, 2013!

Dear colleagues, a wise man once said: “We may not have it all together, but together we have it all”. I sincerely hope that, during my presidency and with your help, this saying will become completely applicable to our society.

Truly yours,

Rudi Campo,

President ESGE