ASGO's Fourth Biennial Meeting, November 12th to 14th, 2015.

Abstract

The Asian Society of Gynecologic Oncology (ASGO) was founded in 2008 with the aim of scientific exchange and collaboration, provision of educational opportunities, deepening friendship between members and ultimately improving care of women with gynecological cancer in Asia [1]. ASGO has an important role as almost half of all gynecologic cancer deaths occur in Asia [2]. Asia itself is a diverse area with wide variations in access to health. Asians also have unique constitutional and genetic backgrounds, characteristics of disease, and socio-cultural issues [1]. An important activity of ASGO is the organization of the Biennial Meetings. Following the success of the previous Biennial Meetings held at Tokyo (2009) [3], Seoul (2011) [4], and Kyoto (2013) [5], ASGO had its 4th Biennial Meeting at the centrally located Lotte Hotel, in downtown Seoul, Korea between 12th and 14th of November, 2015. The theme of the meeting was ‘For the most, For the Best practice in Gynecologic Oncology.’ The chairman of the local organizing committee was Professor Hee-Sug Ryu. The 4th Biennial Meeting was a resounding success. It was a very well organized and interesting meeting. The scientific and educational content was outstanding. Four plenary sessions covering: Current issues in Gynecologic Cancers, Surgery for Gynecologic Cancers, Uterine Cervix, and Ovary; and nine symposia covering the areas of Rare Tumor, International Collaboration of Clinical Trials, Minimally Invasive Surgery for Gynecologic Cancers, Translational Research, Radiation Oncology, Tips for Writing Better Manuscripts, Uterine Corpus, Uterine Cervix, and Ovary were held. In total, 61 invited speakers gave 64 lectures during the meeting. In addition there were 3 Young Doctors sessions and 6 Free Communication sessions with 52 oral presentations and 184 poster presentations. In keeping with the aim of ASGO in providing educational opportunities for young doctors, 17 doctors received travel grants to attend and make presentations at the Young Doctors sessions. Over 450 delegates attended the meeting coming from 25 countries (Table 1, Fig. 1). The international non-Asian invited speakers were Jonathan Ledermann (UK), Dennis Chi (USA), Warner Huh (USA), Robert Coleman (USA), Eric Pujade-Lauraine (France), Gavin Stuart (Canada), Michael Bookman (USA), Christian Marth (Austria), and Peter Lim (USA). Among the interesting presentations at the meeting was a lecture on ovarian tissue cryopreservation in gynecologic cancer by Nao Suzuki (Japan), novel therapeutics in ovarian cancer by Robert Coleman and immunotherapy in ovarian cancer by Eric Pujade-Lauraine. Suk-Joon Chang (Korea) gave an excellent presentation on upper abdominal debulking procedures in advanced ovarian cancer accompanied by illustrative videos of surgical techniques. Aikou Okamoto (Japan) gave a world-first report on the recently held 5th Ovarian Cancer Consensus Conference (OCCC) and Rongyu Zang (China) spoke on nerve sparing procedures in radical trachelectomy (Fig. 2). Lecture slides and video clips are available to ASGO members at the society's website (http://www.asiansgo.org). Professor Joo-Hyun Nam in his Presidential Lecture ‘Evolution of Surgery in Gynecologic Cancer’ described the evolution of radical surgery for cervical cancer from the Wertheim-Okabayashi-Meigs to the nerve sparing radical hysterectomy popularized by Shingo Fujii. He then went on to speak about the Kyoto classification for radical hysterectomy and discussed the trend to less radical surgery for early stage disease, indications for fertility sparing surgery and finally minimally invasive surgery (Fig. 3). Fig. 1 Plenary Session IV for Ovarian Cancer (Speaker, Byoung-Gie Kim, Korea; Chairpersons, Kaznori Ochiai, Japan and Seung-Cheol, Korea). Fig. 2 Lecturers clockwise from left upper, Nao Suzuki, Japan; Robert Coleman, USA; Eric Pujade-Lauraine, France; Suk-Joon Chang, Korea; Aikou Okamoto, Japan; and Rongyu Zang, China. Fig. 3 A commemorative photo after Presidential Lecture (from upper left to right, Suk-Joon Chang, Secretary General of local organizing committee, Korea; Jae-Weon Kim, Treasurer, Korea; Daisuke Aoki, Congress President of the 2016 ASGO Int’l Workshop, ... Table 1 Number of registration and presentations by country At the 10th ASGO council meeting held on 13th November 2015, a number of important issues were discussed. These included the ‘Journal of Gynecologic Oncology (JGO),’ finances, membership, and a by-law review. It was announced again that the JGO will be switched to online-only journal from January 2016. At that meeting, four council members―Zeyi Cao, Mohamad Farid Aziz, Kazunori Ochiai, and Yasuhiro Udagawa―retired and they were replaced by Chunling Chen (China), Andri Andrijono (Indonesia), Nobuo Yaegashi (Japan), and Daisuke Aoki (Japan), respectively. The new president of ASGO Professor Ikuo Konishi was inaugurated and Professor Hee-Sug Ryu was elected as President-Elect (Fig. 4). The first JGO editorial board meeting was held in the morning of November 14 and attended by 29 board members (Fig. 5). Fig. 4 The 10th council meeting of the ASGO, held in Seoul on November 13, 2015. Fig. 5 The First Editorial Board Meeting of the JGO. Nov 14th 2015, Crystal ballroom, Lotte Hotel, Seoul, Korea (back row left to right: Seung-Hyunk Shim, Kyung-Jin Min, Sung-Jong Lee, Dong Hoon Suh, Hariyono Winarto, Eun Ji Nam, Sun Joo Lee, Hung-Cheng Lai, ... The social program started with the President’s Banquet for invited speakers, chairpersons and council members held at the picturesque Samcheonggak. The welcome reception featured an all girl Korean K-pop band who played drums, trumpets, and cymbals. The Gala banquet featured an opera singing performance, ASGO talent show by meeting delegates and the ASGO awards presentation (Fig. 6). Delegates were impressed by the scientific content and careful attention to detail in the organization of the conference and were touched by the warmth and hospitality of the Korean hosts. I would like to acknowledge the tremendous effort of Professor Joo-Hyun Nam, Professor Hee-Sug Ryu, and other members of the local organizing committee and congratulate them for an excellent 4th Biennial Meeting. Fig. 6 A photo from the banquet of the Asian Society of Gynecologic Oncology (ASGO), held in Seoul on November 13, 2015. We will next meet at the 4th International Workshop on Gynecologic Oncology of ASGO which will be held in Sendai, Japan from 12th to 13th November 2016 hosted by Professor Nobuo Yaegashi and the 5th Biennial Meeting of ASGO will be held in Tokyo, Japan from 30th November to 2nd December 2017 hosted by Professor Daisuke Aoki.