European Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel

We are pleased to announce that the EPUAP Review has a new editor, Elia Ricci, a practising surgeon from Italy. He has been an active member of the EPUAP since its founding. I personally have had the pleasure of knowing Elia for a number of years and have been impressed by his dedication to wound management including pressure ulcers which is a major part of his present programme in Italy. He has participated and presented his work at a number of EPUAP annual meetings and we look forward to his input as our new editor. Christine Cherry and Margaret Hughes will continue to serve as administrative editorial assistants as they have done over the years.

The major project of the EPUAP has been the updating of the pressure ulcer prevention guidelines directed by Carol Dealey and Tom Defloor. As you can read from her article this group has made major progress and will meet the deadlines that they have set for completion. The success of the project has been largely due to Dr Katrien Vanderwee of the University of Gent, Belgium who has been funded by the EPUAP in conjunction with Industrial support to assemble and coordinate the mass of literature required for such a project. Katrien has been indispensable in this task. In addition the National Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel (NPUAP USA) at the same time is working on an update of the pressure ulcer treatment guidelines. These projects have brought both of our societies closer to each other. The progress of both of the guideline projects were highlighted at the recent successful 11th Annual EPUAP meeting in Bruges, Belgium in September, 2008.

Carol Dealey dancing with the 'Duke of Burgundy' during the mediæval dinner at eleventh anniversary meeting of the EPUAP, in Bruges.

The success of this meeting was due to several factors, from our co-host the University of Gent, Nursing Sciences, with Professor Tom Defloor as our local coordinator, to the nursing students who worked alongside our business office team in running the meeting. The location - the Oud Sint-Jan Congress Centre, which was built on the old historical city hospital site - was a beautiful and excellent choice of venue suggested by Tom Defloor.

Based on the feedback from the delegates as well as our corporate sponsors the meeting was a great success in its scientific programme as well as the social events that were provided, particularly the mediaeval dinner and entertainment. During the mediaeval dinner three of our members, Carol Dealey, Dan Bader and myself were knighted by the 'Duke of Burgundy'. The poster sessions were also extremely well attended as the accompanying photo shows. The scientific committee under Jacqui Fletcher should be congratulated for the success of the Bruges overall programme.

Carol Dealey and Dan Bader kneel to be ‘knighted’ by the ‘Duke of Burgundy’, during the mediæval dinner in Bruges.

A number of new trustees, as outlined in our President Carol Dealey's letter, were nominated to replace those who had to stand down due to our constitution. In future issues of the EPUAP Review we will give more detailed descriptions of the new trustees' background and their experience related to pressure ulcers. I would like to finish by welcoming these individuals as well as thanking all of those that have retired as trustees.

I would like to personally mention Dr Michael Clark who retired as a trustee and who has made major contributions to the EPUAP in several ways including overseeing the scientific aspect of our annual meetings as Recorder as well as all of the other contributions he has made. I am sure that as a member of the EPUAP he will continue to share his wealth of experience with the society.

The poster session at the 11th EPUAP Meeting in Bruges.

The success of the EPUAP is due to the dedication and hard work of its members and trustees as well as the support from Industry. In this issue we are beginning to feature profile articles on our corporate sponsors and start with an article from Hill-Rom which again has been a major contributor to our success.

With regard to our upcoming Twelfth Annual Meeting in Amsterdam, 3rd - 5th September 2009 we anticipate that this event will be as successful as our previous meetings. This meeting will be under the co-organisation of Dr Maarten Lubbers of the Academic Medical Centre, a founding member who hosted our third meeting (1999) which proved very successful. The First Announcement and Registration Form is included in this issue and we look forward to your participation.

Dr George W. Cherry

EPUAP Business Office