Dear members of the ESC Working Group on Adult Congenital Heart Disease,
We continue to be amid this terrible corona crisis and we sincerely hope you are all in good health and can continue with optimal care for our patients. We all had hoped that by now things start to normalise but it appears that a second wave may be looming.
These are strange times and it is with great pity that we had to cancel EuroGUCH 2020 in Leuven. However, despite the difficulties the ESC Congress 2020 - The Digital Experience was well received and the feedback we heard was excellent. It was also good to see many of you remotely at the London 2020 ACHD Conference in September. Similarly, the meeting of the strategically important Study Group for Adult Congenital Heart Disease (ACHD) in Central and South Eastern Europe (CESEE) which was intended to be held in Budapest hosted by Prof. Hajni Bálinth on 30 October had to be changed to an all-digital event. I want to thank Prof. Hajni Bálinth as well as Prof. Iveta Simkova and Prof. Margarita Brida (Chair and Co-Chair of the CESE ACHD Study Group) for organising the meeting and for their efforts in advancing this flagship project of the working group despite the difficult current situation.
For now, we plan to organise EuroGUCH 2021 in Sevilla, with local host Pastora Gallego as intended. We sincerely hope this will be possible to catch up in person and maintain momentum for the field of ACHD in Europe. Please add to your calendar the dates for EuroGUCH: 4 -5 May 2021. We hope to see you all there and please start preparing your abstracts.
Around the time of ESC Congress 2020 the Nucleus composition changed, and I hope we will be able to send you a brief outline about all (especially the new) Nucleus members with the next newsletter. The current Nucleus composition therefore is:
- Gerhard Paul Diller, Germany - Chairperson
- Michael Gatzoulis, United Kingdom - Chairperson-elect and WG representative in the EHRA Board
- Jolien W Roos-Hesselink, Netherlands - Past-chairperson
- Oktay Tutarel, Germany - Voting member
- Margarita Brida, Croatia - Voting member
- Laura Dos Subira, Spain - Voting member
- Berto Bouma, Netherlands - Voting member
- Giancarlo Scognamiglio, Italy - Voting member
- Magalie Ladouceur, France - Voting member
- Alessandro Giamberti, Italy - Non-voting member, WG link with EACTS
- Daniel Tobler, Switzerland - Non-voting member, ISACHD representative
- Werner Budts, Belgium - Non-voting member, WG link with AEPC
- Sabine Ernst, United Kingdom - Non-voting member, EHRA representative
New members are marked in bold.
At this time, I sincerely want to thank Prof. Roos-Hesselink - my predecessor - for her hard work and all the impact she had on the Working Group during her Chairwomanship. Among many other things she started formally the process of European ACHD accreditation, which is so important for our field and which we hope will be implemented as soon as possible. Until then, there are a number of hurdles to take but we are committed to overcome these difficulties. I also hope we will be able to meet all in person in Sevilla to thank Jolien in person for her outstanding contribution. For now, thank you Jolien!
I wish you all good health and all the best.
Gerhard Diller
Chairperson WG Adult Congenital Heart Disease
Our mission: To reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease.