Objectives And Background

Objectives

This Second Joint Meeting has two principal goals: to provide the newest
and the best evidence on several topics in thoracic surgery, and to review
the most important details of both, time-honored and new procedures and
surgical techniques.

The scientific programme will combine a series of short lectures with video
forum sessions and educational seminars. Particular attention has been
given to the discussion time of the topics in order to promote an active and
rewarding participation.

The scientific programme will be designed to meet the needs of residents as
well as young and senior specialists in thoracic surgery, pneumology, and
oncology.

Background

The International Meetings on General Thoracic Surgery have been
organized by the General Thoracic Surgery Unit of Sagrat Cor, University
Hospital in Barcelona, in 1992, 1994, 1997, 1999 and 2002. International
Faculty members have come from USA and Europe (H. Grillo, W.S. Payne,
H. Ellis, P. Goldstraw, D. Mathisen, R. Landreneau, P. Pairolero, S. Hazelrigg,
S. Cassivi, D. Lardinois, A. Patterson, D. Nuss, I. Vogt Moykopf, A. Lerut, E.
Rendina, K. Naunheim, M.R. Mueller, and others) with a valuable contribution
of the Spanish units in each of the meetings.

The International Workshops on Surgical Exploration of the
Mediastinum and Systematic Nodal Dissection have been organized
in Terrassa, Barcelona, Spain, in 1998, 2000, 2003 and 2006. Nearly 100
speakers from Spain and abroad have participated in these highly specific
meetings. Their highlights have been the live surgery programmes featuring
systematic nodal dissection and lung resection for lung cancer performed
by Japanese thoracic surgeons (T. Naruke, R. Tsuchiya, T. Goya, H.
Kondo, H. Nomori, and H. Asamura), and videomediastinoscopies,
extended cervical videomediastinoscopies, video-assisted mediastinal
lymphadenectomies, performed by staff thoracic surgeons and invited
thoracic surgeons who developed these techniques (M. Huertgen, B. Witte,
M. Zielinski, and J. Kuzdzal). Additionally, topics such as transbronchial
needle aspiration and bronchial and oesophageal ultrasound with fine
needle aspiration have been integrated into the programme due to its
clinical relevance and utility.

The Thoracic Oncology, Thoracic Surgery and Techniques & Transplant
Areas are multidisciplinary collaborative working groups of the Spanish
Society of Pneumology and Thoracic Surgery (SEPAR) mainly composed
by thoracic surgeons and pulmonologists but also by oncologists,
radiologists, pathologists, nurses, etc. The number and quality of the scientific
publications, guidelines and meetings testify to the long tradition and prestige
of these working teams. Some of the most relevant works have been those of
the Bronchogenic Carcinoma Cooperative Group I (GCCB-SEPAR-I) that
registered data from nearly 3000 patients with lung cancer who had
undergone surgical treatment from 1993 to 1997; from the analyses of
the collected data, 31 publications in indexed journals have been already
published; the Spanish Multicenter Study of Neuroendocrine Tumors of
the Lung (EMETNE-SEPAR) with more than 5 publications in indexed journals
specifically related to the treatment and prognosis of neuroendocrine lung
tumors, the Spanish Group for Surgical Resection of Colo-rectal Pulmonary
Metastases (GECMP-CCR-SEPAR) that has just finished the registration
of data from more than 540 patients treated surgically; and the Bronchogenic
Carcinoma Cooperative Group II (GCCB-SEPAR-II), specifically created
to participate in the Prospective Lung Cancer Staging Project of
the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer, that has
registered online more than 2000 patients.

In 2009, the leadership of these three long-standing initiatives joint their
efforts in order to concentrate in a single meeting the updated information on
several topics in the fields of general thoracic surgery and thoracic oncology.
The result was the first International Joint Meeting on Thoracic Surgery that
took place in Barcelona, Spain. National and International Faculty members
from all around the world (P. Goldstraw, H. Asamura, A. Patterson, P. Van
Schil, H. Kondo, S. Cassivi...) came to Barcelona to share knowledge and
experience on relevant topics and novel aspects of the thoracic surgery.
The successful result in terms of scientific quality and number of participants
prompted us to promote the celebration of the second edition of the
International Joint Meeting on Thoracic Surgery.