A thousand new year’s greetings from the ESNR

Paul M. Parizel 0 Guido E. Wilms 0 0 P. M. Parizel Department of Radiology, Antwerp University Hospital (UZA), University of Antwerp (UA), Universiteitsplein 1 , 2610 Antwerp, Edegem, Belgium 1 ) Department of Radiology , UZ Gasthuisberg, Herestraat 49, Leuven, Belgium - Dear ESNR Members, Dear Friends, Another year has come and gone but it feels like only yesterday that we were writing last years New Years greeting. There must be some truth to the old saying that time flies when youre having fun. Indeed, with pride and happiness, we can look back on what was really a very successful year 2011 for the European Society of Neuroradiology (ESNR). Lets start with the big news: our Society has rounded the cape of 1,000 individual members. On 28 November 2011, Dr. Santiago Medrano from Barcelona, became the 1,000th member of ESNR. In only a few short years, membership in our Society has tripled. We are firmly convinced that this resounding success is a reflection of our policy of being inclusive rather than exclusive, and of actively reaching out to all those with an interest in neuroradiology. We expect that with the full implementation of institutional ESNR membership for members of national neuroradiology societies, our numbers will continue to grow in 2012. This brings us to the second item, which is the approval of the new ESNR statutes. On 17 December 2011, during a special business meeting in Antwerp convened by the ESNR Executive Committee, the new statutes of our Society were approved. The documents were diligently prepared by the lawyers of Schmid Attorneys at Law in Zrich, Switzerland. The new statutes are more transparent and structured and will provide our Society with a better legal and fiscal background and protection. Many of you will remember that several important proposals and amendments to the Constitution could not be approved during the Symposium Neuroradiologicum (Bologna, 49 October 2010) and during the 35th Annual Meeting (Antwerp, 2225 September 2011), because we did not reach the required quorum in the ESNR General Assembly. Thanks to the new statutes, these decisions were confirmed during the special business meeting. We approved new ESNR members, whose applications were evaluated by the Membership Committee according to the new rules. The institutional membership was also approved and the presidents of the different national neuroradiological societies or sections will soon receive an invitation to join the ESNR and obtain institutional membership for their national members. We also introduced the concept of pending membership, which allows new members to immediately enjoy reduced registration fees for congresses, courses and meetings organized by the ESNR. Thanks to the implementation of our new statutes, ESNR has become a better structured society, and with the institutional membership we will be able to further increase our membership. The 35th Annual Meeting of ESNR, preceded by the 19th Advanced Course in Diagnostic Neuroradiology and the 3rd Advanced Course on Interventional Neuroradiology, took place in Antwerp from 22 to 25 September 2011, and was organized by Prof. Paul M. Parizel and Prof. Johan Van Goethem (Fig. 1). We can look back on a very successful and pleasurable meeting, attended by almost 700 delegates. The advanced courses in diagnostic and interventional neuroradiology were organized around a central theme: The aging brain and the crumbling spine. The scientific program of the meeting offered a well-balanced mix of diagnostic Fig. 1 Prof. Paul M. Parizel and Prof. J. Van Goethem, Co-Presidents of the 35th Annual Meeting of ESNR in Antwerp, look to the future and interventional neuroradiology topics. Educational opportunities included refresher courses, state-of-the-art sessions, scientific sessions (including multiple parallel sessions), and poster presentations. Professor Claude Manelfe from Toulouse was appointed Honorary Member of ESNR in recognition of his outstanding contributions to European Neuroradiology; he received a standing ovation from the audience. On Sunday morning, the 35th Annual Meeting concluded with a joint session in conjunction with the American Society of Neuroradiology (ASNR) focusing on brain tumours, reflecting the ongoing need for cooperation in the fight against cancer. Despite the beautiful and sunny weather throughout the Antwerp meeting, the refresher courses, state-of the-art lectures and numerous scientific parallel sessions were very well attended (Fig. 2). Fig. 2 View of the 750-seat auditorium where the plenary sessions were held during the 35th Annual ESNR Meeting. All auditoria were located within the historic city campus of the University of Antwerp On Tuesday, 21 September 2011 (the day before the start of the Antwerp meeting), a written and oral examination was organized by Professor Charles Romanowski for those students that completed the full cycle of the Pierre Lasjaunias European Course in Neuroradiology (ECNR). A total of 55 participants took the examination and received the European Certificate of Neuroradiology. The European School of Neuroradiology (ESONR) had a very busy and a successful year as well. As we explained in our New Years greeting last year, ESONR offers three levels of courses. At the first level, in conjunction with the European School of Radiology (ESOR), a Galen Foundation Course in basic neuroradiology was organized from 12 to 14 May 2011 in Iasi, Romania. At the second level, the course modules of the 11th Cycle of the Pierre Lasjaunias European Course of Neuroradiology (ECNR) were on Tumours (Rome, 2529 March 2011, Course Director: Prof. M. Gallucci) and Vascular Diseases (Tarragona, 28 October 1 November 2011, Course Director: Prof. A. Rovira). The 4th and final module of this 11th cycle will cover Trauma/ Degenerative/Metabolic/Inflammatory Diseases and will take place in Milan from 12 to 16 April 2012 (Course Director: M. Gallucci). In the fall of 2012, we shall start the 13th Cycle of the ECNR, under the Co-Directorship of Prof. T. Tali and Prof. A. Gouliamos, and the course venue will alternate between Turkey and Greece. At the third level, a number of different initiatives were taken in the fields of pediatric, interventional and spine neuroradiology. The 5th European Course of Pediatric Neuroradiology (ECPNR) took place in Marseille (2025 January 2011) under the Co-Directorship of Prof. A. Rossi, Prof. M. Argyropoulou and Prof. N. Girard. This course is jointly organized by ESNR, European Society Education, is a review paper based upon the authors own experience, completed with relevant literature data. The second, Short Report, offers authors the possibility to publish very concise cases with a short text of 1,000 words, a maximum of 2 references and 2 figures. In summary, 2011 has been, on all accounts, a very successful year for ESNR, and a year to remember. Success has many fathers and mothers (I dont want to offend anyone) and, ther (...truncated)