ECCEO 9-IOF | ATHENS | GREECE | March 18 - 21, 2009 | Megaron Athens International Conference Centre
Daily News 1
DEAR GUEST
It is an honour and a great privilege to welcome you to this 9th European Congress on Clinical and Economic Aspects of Osteoporosis and Osteoarthritis (ECCEO9) organised by the European Society for Clinical and Economic Aspects of Osteoporosis and Osteoarthritis (ESCEO) and International Osteoporosis Foundation (IOF). This congress, which is held in Athens, between March 18 and March 21 has a particular flavour to us. Actually, it is the 12th Anniversary of ECCEO since ECCEO1 was organised in Liège, Belgium, in 1997. Since that moment, ECCEO has dramatically grown to be now the largest event, in Europe and most likely, worldwide, fully dedicated to the clinical and economic aspects of osteoporosis and osteoarthritis. The recent meetings, held in Vienna (2006), Porto (2007) and Istanbul (2008) have gathered more than 3500 delegates and this number will be, undoubtedly, largely exceeded for ECCEO9 this year.
The Scientific Advisory Committee, co-chaired by Professor René Rizzoli and Professor Cyrus Cooper, had an extremely difficult task, to select oral presentations, within more than 600 submitted abstracts of the highest quality.
During this congress, you will probably hear a lot about FRAX. FRAX is a fracture risk assessment tool that was developed under the aegis of the World Health Organization by John Kanis and a group of epidemiologists. It was published in 2008, after being impatiently awaited for years, and is now universally accessible free of charge on the Internet (www.shef.ac.uk/FRAX). The FRAX algorithms give the 10-year probability of hip fracture and the 10-year probability of a major osteoporotic fracture. Needless to say that you will have the opportunity to discuss this new tool with experts present at this meeting.
Besides this congress, ESCEO has been an extremely active society, during the last years. ESCEO proudly organised working groups dedicated to produce consensus documents on burning issues in our fi eld of interest. The last twelve months, ESCEO has issued 5 consensus documents:
S. Ormarsdottir et al. Osteoporosis International 2008; 19: 725-731
O. Bruyère et al. Current Medical Research and Opinions 2008,24:2841-2851
J. Goldhahn et al. Bone 2008, 43: 343-347
J. Goldhahn et al. J Bone Joint Surg Am. 2008; 90 Suppl 1:43-47.
O. Bruyère et al. BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders 2008, 9:165-174
In collaboration with the Group for the Respect of Ethics and Excellence in Science (GREES), ESCEO contributed to the revision of the guidelines for the registration of drugs in osteoporosis, recently issued by the Committee for Human Proprietary Products (CHMP) at the European Agency for Evaluation of Medicine (EMEA) and is now currently working on a chart for the ideal partnership between academic scientists and pharmaceutical industry.
During this ECCEO9 congress, prestigious scientists, from all parts of the world will give you the opportunity to be in touch with the latest scientific developments in various fields. Six invited communications will be given:
S. Silverman
C. Cooper
S. Majumdar
C. Roux
C. Lee
J.-P. Pelletier
We will also have the pleasure to hear the debate on the long-term treatment of osteoporosis with bisphosphonates (J. Bilezikian and S.E. Papapoulos).
Several companies have also designed the program of satellite symposia which have been carefully reviewed by the organisers to make sure that an appropriate amount of unbiased science will be outlined during these satellite symposiums.
We really hope that you will enjoy this ECCEO9 congress, in the beautiful surroundings of the Athens area and that the key messages that you will take home after the meeting will help you in your daily practice for the benefit of your patients.
We wish you a happy, enjoyable and fruitful meeting.
John A. Kanis
Co-organiser
Jean-Yves Reginster
Co-organiser