Society Communications Young Investigators Meeting 2014 Uta Eberlein, YIM’14 Award Winner On 17 and 18 July of this year, 16 young researchers from nine European countries met for the Young Investigators Meeting of the EANM, once again held in Vienna. This event was established in 2009 with the aim of enabling young scientists in nuclear medicine to exchange knowledge and to present and discuss their own research. The meeting also offers a great opportunity to meet young peers to share experience in research and in routine work in a nuclear medicine department. The topic of this year’s meeting was “Radionuclide Therapy: New Perspectives and Treatment Optimization”. The meeting opened with an introduction to the Young EANM Committee by Nena Ristevska, the Educational Representative of the Young EANM Committee, and this was followed by a short presentation by Glenn Flux, present Chair of the Dosimetry Committee, about dosimetry in therapy. Lisa Bodei, Chair of the Radionuclide Therapy Committee, closed the introductory round of the YIM moderators by providing the criteria for the evaluation of our projects and the presentations. The quality of all the submitted abstracts was very high and the moderators therefore did not have an easy decision in choosing the winner. Before the presentations started, everyone introduced themselves. Most of the participants were resident physicians. However, as dosimetry was also included in the programme, physicists, a biologist, a chemist and a surgeon were also participating. A wide range of topics were presented during the 15-min slots allocated for each young scientist. Examples are:

– – – – – –

Optimisation of radioiodine therapy in patents with differentiated thyroid cancer Treatment optimisation with I-124 mIBG dosimetry for I-131 mIBG therapies Cellular dosimetry Different aspects of somatostatin receptor therapies with Lu-177 Blood-based dosimetry using DNA damage biomarkers A dosimetry study for Xofigo therapies

Each talk was followed by ten minutes of discussion. These discussions were very fruitful and gave all participants the opportunity to obtain suggestions regarding their own project from their peers and also from the experienced moderators. At the end of the first day, a dinner at a very nice restaurant located on a ship on the Danube was organised by the EANM. We were served excellent food and drinks and were able to discuss the day and talk to each other in an informal relaxed atmosphere. The meeting ended with a general discussion on the role of radionuclide therapy and dosimetry. A lot of ideas were proposed by the young researchers to enhance the use and acceptance of radionuclide therapy in clinical practice. All points were collected in a written report that will be forwarded to the moderators, Lisa Bodei, Glenn Flux and Nena Ristevska, from the Young EANM Committee. After this discussion the moderators thanked everyone for taking part in this excellent meeting with outstanding talks and projects.

At the close of the meeting, the YIM Award 2014 was presented by Nena Ristevska. I received the award for my presentation on “Blood-based Dosimetry in Radiopeptide Therapy: Can the Gamma-H2AX-Assay Predict Individual Radiation Sensitivity?” The research that I presented at YIM14 is part of my ongoing PhD project at the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the University of Würzburg, Germany. At the EANM Congress 2014 in Gothenburg, Sweden, I had the opportunity to present my project in the Young EANM Daily Forum. Next year’s YIM will be held on the topic of “New tracers for pre-clinical and clinical use—from bench to bedside”. The moderators will be Marion De Jong, Chair of the Translational Molecular Imaging Committee, and Antony Gee, Chair of the Drug Development Committee. I am very happy and greatly honoured to have received this year’s award. I would like to thank Lisa Bodei, Glenn Flux and Nena Ristevska for choosing a medical physicist’s project

"Society communications" are items of general interest for the nuclear medicine community: • Reports on meetings • National society news • Courses, fellowships • Other items of interest Announcements of meetings or industry advertisements cannot be published in this section. Mail your text to [email protected] [email protected]

Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging DOI 10.1007/s00259-014-2912-6

Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging (2014) 41:2362–2363

for the award. In my opinion this shows that strong interdisciplinary collaboration between medicine, medical physics, radiochemistry and biology is really important. I could not have done this research without the help of the medical doctors in our department and our cooperating radiation biologist, Prof. Harry Scherthan from the Bundeswehr Institute of Radiobiology, Munich. I would also like to thank my supervisor, Prof. Michael Lassmann, who encouraged me to apply for this meeting and who has provided great support for my PhD project. Dipl.–Phys. Uta Eberlein YIM Award Winner 2014 Statement by the moderators The topic of this meeting was proposed by the Young EANM Committee and as current Chairs of the EANM Dosimetry and Radionuclide Therapy Committees we were delighted to be moderators. The standard of abstracts submitted to the meeting was exceptional and all were accepted. The

2363

format of the meeting included plenty of time for discussion following excellent presentations from each participant, and from the outset all contributed to lively and fruitful debate. It was particularly refreshing that there was no reluctance to admit to areas of uncertainty and that all were prepared to submit their ideas for future clinical and research studies to the group. The meeting particularly benefited from the multidisciplinary input, and the scientific content easily rivalled that of important international meetings. In all, the meeting offered great cause for optimism for the future of therapy with radiopharmaceuticals. The Young Investigators Meetings are an excellent initiative that will help to form the networks important to the future of nuclear medicine in Europe. As a multidisciplinary forum (with the added benefit of free attendance for participants) they are to be highly recommended. Dr. Glenn Flux Dr. Lisa Bodei

Young Investigators Meeting 2014 Uta Eberlein, YIM'14 Award Winner.

Young Investigators Meeting 2014 Uta Eberlein, YIM'14 Award Winner. - PDF Download Free
107KB Sizes 0 Downloads 7 Views