Of interest to the entire EAPC community
- Inaugural session
- Late-Breaking Science
- Young Investigator Awards
- EAPC 2021 Championship
- Closing ceremony including the Viviane Conraad's Outstanding Achievement Award presentation
See the full programme.
The programme this year includes live sessions and a channel dedicated to each of the four EAPC sections, covering the entire scope of prevention.
Eight EAPC section and Young Community leaders share their recommendations for a few of the must-attend sessions.
Primary Care and Risk-Factor Management
Keep communicating – from primary care to long-term prevention
This session is taking place on 17 April at 11:20 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Christi Deaton, Primary Care and Risk Factor Management Section
Although it is a vital part of our clinical work, communication with patients and with our colleagues in the multi-professional team is not always effective. Our speakers in this session will provide the benefits of their expertise about effective communication.
Corporate healthcare or wellness programmes can help to maintain a healthy workforce, but how best to communicate the need to address cardiovascular risk factors and engage with an often young workforce? Communication with patients can be challenged by jargon or professional language, noisy environments, not allowing enough time and the need for translation. What are the strategies that can be used to improve communication with patients? Surprisingly, communication among members of the healthcare team is not always clear. The multi-disciplinary team may all be healthcare professionals, but different professions can have different communication styles and traditions that may hinder effective communication to the detriment of working relations and patient care.
Join this session to hear from our three speakers and a distinguished panel of discussants around the issues of communication in the workplace – both corporate and in healthcare settings – and with our patients. The key to prevention and decreasing cardiovascular risk is clear communication with employees and patients about risk and what can be done to lower risk, and with our multi-professional colleagues.
Joint management of familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH) by primary and secondary care
This session is taking place on 16 April at 08:50 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Maria Antonopoulou, Primary Care and Risk Factor Management Section
Familial hypercholesterolaemia comprise a major cause of premature coronary heart disease, a condition that worldwide still remains unrecognised and untreated. Early identification and management of FH continue to be a challenge for both primary and secondary care. The approaches of cardiologists, general practitioners and epidemiologist are discussed, under the common scope to highlight the importance of effective diagnosis and treatment of FH patients by increasing professional awareness and multidisciplinary communication.
Join this session and listen to the three speakers and the panel of discussants analysing different perspectives and deriving proposals for the role of both primary and secondary care and their collaboration to improve the management of FH for the good of the patients, their families and the general population.
Secondary Prevention & Rehabilitation
Artificial intelligence and big data: what can they do for us?
This session is taking place on 16 April at 08:50 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Andreas Gevaert, Secondary Prevention & Rehabilitation Section
In this session, hosted by ESC Digital Health Committee chair Martin Cowie (London, UK), the role of big data and artificial intelligence (AI) in Cardiology, and specifically in Preventive Cardiology, is illustrated.
Leonard Hofstra (Utrecht, The Netherlands) kicks off by showing potential applications of AI and machine learning in cardiovascular risk reduction. However, ‘big data’ approaches also have their limitations, as Paul Leeson (Oxford, UK) shows using examples from cardiovascular imaging. Lis Neubeck (Edinburgh, UK) presents the advantages and disadvantages of the ongoing computerisation of medical professions and asks if we are “entering the era of the digital nurse”? Finally, the added value of digital support in exercise prescription is demonstrated by Dominique Hansen (Hasselt, Belgium). He highlights the EAPC Expert tool, a decision support tool with automated features but curated by human researchers.
To conclude, discussants Veronique Cornelissen (Leuven, Belgium), Claudio Gil Araujo (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Paul Dendale (Hasselt, Belgium) and Martijn Scherrenberg (Hasselt, Belgium) engage with the speakers in a debate on “what AI and big data can do for us”.
Beyond endurance: strength training in cardiovascular rehabilitation
This session is taking place on 17 April at 09:45 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Andreas Gevaert, Secondary Prevention & Rehabilitation Section
In this session, the “why, who and how” of strength training in cardiovascular rehabilitation (CR) is discussed.
Heinz Völler (Rüdersdorf bei Berlin, Germany) kicks off the session by explaining how we can identify patients that need strength training. He zooms in on the assessment of frailty, and how this impacts cardiovascular outcomes. Next, Marie-Christine Iliou (Paris, France) reviews the current society recommendations on strength training in CR, and gives an overview of the evidence these are based on. Recently, high-intensity strength training has gained interest among the CR community. Maria Bäck (Linkoping, Sweden) tells us what the advantages and disadvantages are of this novel approach to strength training. Finally, Sofia Viamonte (Porto, Portugal) highlights the potential benefits of including inspiratory muscle training in special populations, focusing on the results of the ARISTOS-HF trial (EJPC).
In the discussion, session chair Justien Cornelis (Brussels, Belgium) and discussants Rita Pinto (Lisbon, Portugal), Dominique Hansen (Hasselt, Belgium) and Andreas Gevaert (Groningen, The Netherlands) discuss among others a forthcoming position statement by the Secondary Prevention and Cardiovascular Rehabilitation section of the EAPC on exercise intensity assessment and prescription in CR.
Preventive cardiology in the era of COVID-19: the challenges
This session is taking place on 15 April at 15:30 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Maria Simonenko, Secondary Prevention & Rehabilitation Section
It's been a year since the COVID-19 pandemic started and it has been a challenge in all aspects of preventive cardiology: from prevention to rehabilitation, from schemes of management to remote consultations. Don’t miss this session where EAPC experts such as Marco Ambrosetti, Michael Papadakis and Vassilios Vassiliou share their experience and solutions in managing patients during COVID-19 times.
The central role of CPET in heart failure - live demonstration
This session is taking place on 16 April at 14:10 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Maria Simonenko, Secondary Prevention & Rehabilitation Section
Every year the number of heart failure patients is increasing, the same as new management is developing. But what about diagnostics and how to estimate dynamic in heart failure patients not only by their complaints? Experts Matthias Wilhelm, Hareld Kemps, Marco Guazzi and Frank Edelmann will highlight the CPET method and create an interesting discussion.
Dyslipidaemia and type 2 diabetes - the two ugly sisters
This session is taking place on 17 April at 16:40 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Maria Simonenko, Secondary Prevention & Rehabilitation Section
From arterial hypertension to ischaemic heart disease, from atherosclerosis to renal dysfunction - there are so many diseases that we know how to manage but don't forget about prevention and risk factors.
Dyslipidaemia and type 2 diabetes are two different sides, going hand in hand. Join this symposium and have a look from a different side.
Sports Cardiology & Exercise
Sessions not to miss in sports cardiology
Recommended by Flavio D’Ascenzi and Sabiha Gati, Sports Cardiology & Exercise Section
This year the updates and essentials of sports cardiology are coming to you!
Athlete’s heart in women, imaging, cardiopulmonary exercise testing, prevention of sudden cardiac death, pre-participation screening and the take-home messages of the NEW 2020 ESC Guidelines on Sports Cardiology and Exercise in Patients: all this from the comfort of your home!
- Athlete's heart and cardiovascular remodelling in women - More details
- Essentials in sports cardiology - More details
- 2020 ESC Guidelines on Sports Cardiology and Exercise in Patients put into Practice - More details
- Cardiac screening of athletes: an integral part of prevention? More details
Population Science and Public Health
Essentials of nutrition
This session is taking place on 16 April at 10:55 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Vassilis Vassiliou, Population Science and Public Health Section Chair
Can nutrition help achieve a healthy heart? A question that many of us ask, or get asked, very frequently!
You want to learn more? Come and join us in this session organised by the Population Science and Public Health section where experts in the field discuss diets for a healthy heart (V Vassiliou, UK; C Guerreiro, PT), the good ones, the bad ones and the ugly ones! We go from fasting, to veganism and paleo and debate whether these are myths or science (P Marques-Vidal, CH; D Panagiotakos, GR)? We also discuss chocolate and wine! Are they the forbidden joy? (T. Lusher, UK and A. Michalidou, AU). And we finally touch the difficult issue of whether we can actually manage to create a healthy food environment. (P Parwani, USA and A Cassidy, UK). The discussion is coordinated by the past chair of the section Prof. Monique Verschuren, NL.
We can all learn from this session and we hope that you join us there. We will be there too… “on site” virtually, to respond to any chat questions you might have!
EAPC Young Community
Healthy cardiovascular ageing, is it possible?
This session is taking place on 17 April at 09:45 CEST. More details.
Recommended by Savvas Hadjiphilippou, EAPC Young Community
Our population is growing older and so is the lifetime accumulated burden of cardiovascular disease for individuals. Join us for this extremely interesting and insightful session on the mechanisms of cardiovascular ageing, how we can work as a team to help our elderly. Is there an elixir for longevity?
Register now to secure your online access to the congress. Don't forget - EAPC Members benefit from a reduced congress fee. And, ESC Preventive Cardiology is accredited with 19 Continuing Medical Education (CME) Credits.
Note: The content of this article reflects the personal opinion of the author/s and is not necessarily the official position of the European Society of Cardiology.
Our mission: To reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease.