Newsletter May 2012 - European Hematology Association

17 th Congress of the
European Hematology Association
Over the years the Annual Congress of EHA has become a meeting
place for hema to logists from all fields of the specialty.
> Statistics
The 17 th Congress achieved a new record attendance - in
Amsterdam, EHA welcomed more than 9,200 delegates (9243),
as well as around a thousand exhibitors and satellite
organizers. A steady proportion of the delegates is from
Europe, with the increase in the numbers largely reflecting the
growing number of Asian delegates.
For inclusion in the abstract program, 2075 abstracts were
submitted online. After the review was completed, by 230
abstract reviewers from 21 countries, the abstracts were
selected as follows:
Oral presentation 7%
Poster presentation 49%
Publication only 37%
Rejected 7%
The six best abstracts were selected for oral presentation at
the Presidential Symposium, with the remainder presented in
30 simultaneous sessions.
In order to help young investigators attend the annual
congress, EHA awarded 74 travel grants based on abstract
scores. New this year was a travel grant, sponsored by the
Giuseppe Bigi Association, which provided funding for the best
Italian scientist. The grant was awarded to Elisa Rumi from
Pavia, Italy.
Scientific Program
The diverse and exciting scientific program, consisting of 130
sessions and 24 satellites symposia, was compiled by the
Scientific Program Committee and Advisory Board, led by
Professor Tony Green (Cambridge University, United Kingdom).
As well as the long established Education Sessions,
18 > EHA Newsletter November 2012
Hematology-in-Focus Sessions, Lunch Debates and Meet-the-
Experts, the scientific program was strengthened by a number
of sessions of special interest.
New in the program this year was the trainee session with a
special focus on education and training in Europe. This focus
will also continue next year. In Stockholm where additional
sessions will be dedicated to trainees and junior hematologists.
Also new was the collaboration between the EHA Scientific
Working Groups (SWG) and the Scientific Program Committee,
where two SWG programs (Red cells and iron, and chronic
myeloid leukemia) were selected for the Hematology-in-Focus
sessions.
EHA Annual Business Meeting
Besides the annual and financial report, the results of the
Ballot 2012 were also approved during the Business Meeting
and a new Secretary to the EHA Executive Board was
appointed: Tony Green (Cambridge University, United Kingdom).
In addition, two new Board members were officially appointed
for the term 2012 – 2016;
• Andreas Engert (Germany)
• Gert Ossenkoppele (The Netherlands)
Awards
The Annual Congress is an important platform for the
Association to present the awards of the Career Development
Program and to honor the outstanding hematologists within its
ranks. The winners of the EHA Career Development program
were awarded during the Opening Ceremony. For more
information on the awards and the winners, see pages 14-16.
Two hematologists are honored annually for their special
contribution to the field of hematology. This year the José
Carreras Award was awarded to Professor Jesús San Miguel
for his research, which he presented in the José Carreras
Lecture. The Jean Bernard Lifetime Achievement Award was
presented to Laurent Degos, for his contribution to hematology
through his pioneering work on the pathogenesis and
treatment of acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL).
Amsterdam Young Scientist Award
The municipality of Amsterdam is developing its reputation as
a City of Knowledge. Key to this is the exchange of knowledge
at congresses and the interaction between the promotion of
scientific talent and excellent facilities for congresses can lead
to remarkable results. To promote this aim, the municipal
authorities of Amsterdam and their destination partners have
launched the ‘Amsterdam Young Scientist Award’, which
consists of a plaque and a prize of 5000 Euros as an incentive
for the development of young talent within a scientific
discipline in the broadest sense. For the 17 th Congress of EHA
this important mark of recognition was awarded to Dr Niccolò
Bolli from Cambridge, for his abstract titled “Whole exome
sequencing defines clonal architecture and genomic evolution
in Multiple Myeloma.” EHA is very grateful for the opportunity
to reward one of its most promising scientists through this
unique and highly appreciated initiative.
Scientific highlights in the lymphoid malignancies
(Paolo Ghia)
Past EHA congresses have witnessed the radical change that
has occurred recently in the research agenda in CLL. After a
decade of research that has led to dramatic changes in our
understanding of the biology of the disease, this knowledge
has now been transferred to the clinical arena with an array of
novel therapeutic agents that have been designed to
specifically target intracellular pathways relevant for the
survival and expansion of the leukemic clone. The oral session
“CLL – Clinical” held on Saturday was paradigmatic. Here all of
the talks were dedicated to these novel agents, encompassing
inhibitors of the BCR pathways, of CDK molecules and of
apoptosis regulators. Coming full circle, the presidential
symposium also focused on lymphoproliferative disorders,
underscoring the large number of novel discoveries taking
place in this area of research. The use of novel therapies also
leads to new questions on their actual mechanisms of action,
which are often more fascinating than anticipated. The talk
given at the symposium by Dr Alan Ramsay from London
helped to clarify the complicated mechanisms of action of the
drug lenalidomide, and how it can prevent the immunomodulatory
effect produced by CLL cells on both autologous
and allogeneic T cells. This occurs through the blockade of
distinct inhibitory ligands (200, CD274, CD276, TNFRSF14),
typically expressed by malignant cells resulting in downregulation
of lytic synapse function in global T cell populations.
These data may help to design more efficacious
immunotherapeutic strategies to reverse T cell tolerance in
cancer. (See also pages 4-5 by Alan Ramsay).
At the same symposium, cutting-edge results on whole
genome sequencing in Multiple Myeloma (MM) were presented
by Dr Niccolò Bolli (AYSA Winner) from Cambridge in
collaboration with colleagues from Boston. He elegantly
showed a genetic complexity in MM that was previously
unreported, with a number of recurrent undescribed variants.
In addition, the work showed an unsuspected heterogeneity of
the malignant clone, already at the time of diagnosis, with
clonal evolution upon progression that may help to track
EHA Newsletter November 2012 > 19