I know we are all eager to meet in Madrid for the 27th International Congress of The Transplantation Society. The meeting will give us the opportunity to exchange ideas and reaffirm our camaraderie. Nowadays, we are all so busy and there are so many meetings that sometimes it is difficult to prioritize what to attend. All transplant disciplines are represented at the meeting; this gives us an opportunity to learn from experience with other organs and from colleagues with expertise in areas which apply to all organs. We have developed two new committees – heart/ lung and anesthesia/critical care; we will have an opportunity to hear from these disciplines as well as from experts in xenotransplantation, cell transplant, islet and pancreas, intestinal transplant and rehabilitation, organ donation and procurement, vascularized composite grafts, infectious disease, and pediatric transplantation. As the largest global organization of transplant professionals, TTS will also afford you the chance to network with friends from around the world. I look forward to seeing you there.

The Declaration of Istanbul Custodial Group will lead the celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the Declaration of Istanbul and give us all the opportunity to participate in commenting on their draft update of the Declaration. The idea is not to change the tenets of the Declaration, but to reinforce the ability to combat transplant tourism by promoting national self-sufficiency.

The Transplantation Society has been asked to respond to the proposed Global Kidney Exchange- GKE. The TTS Executive has publically stated our opposition to this proposal, but I wanted to ensure that our membership understands the rationale. The exchange involves an international arrangement by which a donor/recipient pair from a low or middle-income country is offered free transplantation and early postoperative care at a center within a high-income country. There is additional, but limited (in time), longer term support. Our major objections relate to the finite nature of long term follow up, the potential for commercialization of the donor from a low-income country, and the potential that such a system does not foster the development of self-sufficiency within the low or middle-income country.

As transplant activity develops around the world, we realize the central role that TTS continues to play in professional education, the development of protocols for optimal patient management, dissemination of discovery in transplant biology, and the ethical framework for transplant activities.

We provide advice regarding the role of governments in supporting transplant activities and the elements in developing national self-sufficiency. Our efforts have frequently been on a national basis as well as in international forums. We have been fortunate to advise the World Health Organization- WHO in their important work articulating ethical transplant activity.

Besides Madrid 2018, two important activities dictate your participation. We have just finished a poll of our members to give us an idea of where you would like to see the 2022 International Congress of The Transplantation Society held. The sites we examined were Buenos Aires, Istanbul and Montreal (listed alphabetically). The membership poll will be an important variable in consideration of the viability of each site. It was gratifying to see the large numbers of TTS members who took the time to let us know your preferences. We hope to announce the selected site by the time of the Madrid meeting.

The other major activity in which your participation is key is the TTS election of new council members and executives for the 2018-2020 term. You have been sent the slate of individuals who represent a wide breadth of specialties and regions; it is our responsibility to choose those individuals who represent what is best in our organization. Representation on Council is reflective of the different regions making up the global transplant community; the number of councilors representing each region is determined by the number of TTS members in the region. Our membership is rapidly growing in the Middle East and Latin America. The Transplantation Society is unique among transplantation groups in that we have an open election and EVERY individual on the ballot is voted on by EVERY member throughout the world. This approach serves to protect our global nature and allows us to elect individuals who will further our global perspective. We will announce the 2018-2020 election results by the time of the Madrid meeting.

With your help and participation, I am confident of the central role of The Transplantation Society in supporting and shaping transplant activity throughout the world. I look forward to seeing you in Madrid!

Sincerely,
Nancy L. Ascher, M.D, PhD
President, The Transplantation Society
Professor, Department of Surgery





First held in 2001, the FOCiS Annual Meeting draws the best clinician scientists from around the world to participate in the scientific program, bringing together cutting-edge science from various disease fields related to clinical immunology.

The FOCiS approach to clinical immunology is unique, concentrating on breaking down clinical barriers between specialties and focusing on the shared pathologies of diseases and conditions. At FOCiS 2018, researchers and clinicians from over 40 disease and specialty-specific societies will unite to share knowledge across traditional disease borders, and identify commonalities between treatments and therapies that are life changing for those affected with immune-mediated diseases.

Why FOCiS 2018 is Right for You!

• Get Ahead:
  See the latest developments across immunology disciplines to uncover novel solutions to the challenges facing the transplantation community

• Grow Your Knowledge:
  Three educational courses held before the meeting to fill your knowledge gaps, including Basic Immunology in Medicine, Cancer Immunity and Immunotherapy, and Systems Immunology. Package registration rates are available

• Network with Colleagues:
  FOCiS 2018 is large enough to draw leaders from across immunology disciplines, but small enough to actually network with them

• Great Location:
  The San Francisco Marriott Marquis is minutes from many popular attractions, including the Moscone Center, Yerba Buena Gardens, Union Square shopping and AT&T Park, home of the Giants.

Stay ahead of the curve by making plans to attend FOCiS 2018. With an innovative lineup of topics and presenters, the FOCiS 2018 program has something for everyone! See you in San Francisco! #FOCiS

This year, a total of 13 center pairs were supported by the partnership between The Transplantation Society (TTS) and the International Society of Nephrology (ISN) in their efforts to develop transplantation services in regions like Nepal, Myanmar, India, Guatemala, Palestine, Philippines, Colombia and Armenia.

We welcome and congratulate our new freshman applicants Tanzania-UK and Vietnam-Australia to the program. The ISN-TTS Sister Transplant Centers Program is proud to help create successful and sustained collaborations between centers that continue for many years. The Malaysia-Australia and the India-Italy sister centers cooperation are good examples of lasting commitments to bring transplantation services to regions in need of professional support. To find out more about the ISN-TTS Sister Transplant Centers Program, please visit www.tts.org/affiliations/initiatives/isn-tts-sister-transplant-center-program.

At the end of 2018, two centers will have successfully completed the ISN-TTS Sister Transplant Centers Program and will graduate after six years. The Guatemala-US and Palestine-UK sister pairs have demonstrated that continuous joined efforts result in fantastic examples of what can be achieved through professional and human collaborations across the globe. Congratulations to our two-level A graduates.

At the upcoming TTS 2018 Congress in Madrid, a showcase of the ISN-TTS Sister Transplant Centers Program will be available at the TTS booth. Delegates can visit the interactive presentations of the ISN-TTS Sister Transplant Centers Program and some of the participating sister centers will share their experience on site. For all Congress information and detailed program, please visit www.tts2018.org.

The Education Committee (EC) had many activities in 2017 and is continuing to expand its programming throughout 2018 via popular webinar series and in-depth pre-congress workshops taking place during the TTS 2018 Congress in Madrid.

The “Trainee Tracks” Webinar Series wrapped up in February and the “Trends and Challenges in Liver Transplantation” Webinar Series is currently underway. Also the Leadership Series, supported by Sanofi, was launched in 2017. This series is designed to encompass necessary topics to assure success within key business practices used by medical professionals today, such as: leadership competencies, systems thinking, leading innovations, organizational transformation, organization skills, communication and negotiation, business planning and quantitative health sciences for leaders. Each of the topics is covered over eight months of webinar sessions, designated in four individual Working Groups, and coached by a senior member of TTS. Each participant has submitted a project on which they will work for the eight-month period. You can learn more about the Leadership Series during the TTS 2018 Congress in Madrid at the TTS Studio on Tuesday, July 3rd.


The EC is also working with the World Transplant Games Federation (WTGF) to develop healthy lifestyle care modules for post-transplant patients. A great program has been developed for the TTS-WTGF Pre-Congress Workshop entitled “Optimizing Recovery after Solid Organ Transplant – The Role of Physical Activity, Exercise and Sport.”

Additionally, the EC has teamed up with the International Transplant Nurses Society (ITNS) for another Pre-Congress Workshop, “Transplantation Nursing 101.” This one-day symposium is designed for nurses, transplant coordinators and members of the Allied Health Groups.

The EC always welcomes proposals for new educational programming. Kindly email committees@tts.org if you have any questions.

NEW! The Kathryn Wood
Transplant Science International Fellowship

We are pleased to present a new Transplant Science Committee initiative: the Kathryn Wood Transplant Science International Fellowship. This special award, named in recognition of Professor Wood’s contributions to the science of transplantation immunology, includes $10,000 USD and a special award plaque. This award will be given every two years and coincide with the annual TTS Congress.

The objective of the award is to provide support for a transplant science trainee, either basic or translational, in the development of their area of research and aid cross fertilization of ideas and networking within the transplant science community. The award will equally support female and male trainees in both clinical and basic transplant research, and reflect the regional scope of the TTS mission to be a global community. Both the Fellow and recipient laboratory leader must be TTS members. The intention is not to fund a research project or provide support for already established collaborations, but to facilitate new interactions and training opportunities by providing financial support towards airfares, visas and accommodation. The duration of a Fellowship is expected to be approximately 3 months.

The ESOT Basic Science Meeting

This year the TTS Transplant Science Committee is co-sponsoring the ESOT Basic Science Meeting in Rotterdam, Netherlands in the Fall of 2018. This will be a very interesting meeting covering hot topics in transplantation science, including genome editing, ischemia-reperfusion injury, stem cell therapies, and gender differences in transplantation.

Transplantation Science Symposium
Asian Regional Meeting

Later this year we look forward to the TSS Asian Regional Meeting to be held in Taipei Taiwan (November 23rd to 25th 2018). This exciting meeting, co-hosted by the Transplantation Society of Taiwan and TTS, is held every two years and represents a great opportunity for people in the region to hear and understand the results of the latest basic transplant research as well as network with international colleagues. More information can be found on the website www.tss2018taiwan.org with further updates as the meeting draws closer.

TTS Madrid 2018

We look forward to the upcoming TTS Congress in Madrid, at which excellent educational programmes have been planned during the Post-Graduate Courses and the virtual Global Transplantation Laboratory Pre-Congress Workshop. Sign up today!

The Brent and Monaco Awards

Once again, the deadline is fast approaching for nominations for Leslie Brent Award and the Anthony P. Monaco Award. Named after two pioneering giants of the transplantation field, one award is made to the best basic science paper (Brent Award) and one award is made to the best translational science paper (Monaco Award) published in the TTS journal Transplantation. The selection committee includes editors of Transplantation in addition to members and Chairs of the Transplantation Science Committee. These are highly competitive awards and will be presented to the successful awardees at the 2018 TTS Congress in Madrid.

2016 AWARD WINNERS

We congratulate all authors on their achievements. Both manuscripts are freely available at TransplantJournal.com

In addition to sponsoring 5 awards, TTS will be co-sponsoring the following awards:

To celebrate the 10th Anniversary of the Declaration of Istanbul, the DICG is holding a one day workshop as part of the Pre-Congress program at the International Congress of The Transplantation Society. The workshop will take place on July 1, in Madrid. It will comprise a half-day morning program addressing common ethical and clinical dilemmas in the management of organ donation and transplantation cases that may involve organ trafficking, and a half-day afternoon program exploring the DoI (2018 Edition) and the results of the public consultation.

To mark this special event a working group has prepared an update of the Declaration. The revisions made in this 2018 Edition are intended to ensure that the DoI remains a valuable source of ethical guidance for health professionals and policy makers for the next decade in the face of persisting and emerging challenges in organ trafficking and transplant tourism around the world.

We are now seeking feedback on the draft 2018 Edition from all our DICG members, members of organisations that have endorsed the DoI, and members of the broader transplant community. Participation involves completion of an online survey in which you will be asked to review the draft DoI (2018 Edition) and comment. The survey will be open until April 20, 2018. For more information, and to participate in the survey, please visit:

www.surveymonkey.com/r/DoI_2018_Edition

The workshop will feature several DICG members as speakers, and we hope to see many more transplant professionals among the workshop participants. To view the program and register for the workshop, go to tts2018.org/program/pre-congress-workshops.

Women in Transplantation (WIT) has been very active this past year. During the WIT retreat in May, 2017, WIT decided to split its focus between two strategic Pillars which have specific goals. The first pillar, Advancing and Inspiring Women Transplant Professionals, aims to ensure equity in transplantation professional society leadership, promote more women speakers in international and national meetings, more monetary grants/awards going to women transplantation professionals, and lastly more women in the profession, connected to and supporting each other.

The second Pillar is Championing Issues of Sex and Gender in Transplantation. This Pillar aims to gain more money (sustainable funding) going to projects (data collection, research, education, etc.) to address issues of sex and gender in transplantation, designated sessions on issues of sex and gender at all major national and international transplant meetings, double the percentage of female organ transplant recipients (especially in countries with disparities), and lastly decrease disparities in the number of male and female living donors worldwide.

With the support of Novartis, WIT hosted a networking dinner in Los Angeles on January 25th during which attendees had the privilege of hearing Dr. Deborah Clegg of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center speak about the importance of acknowledging the role of sex in medicine. WIT is planning to host more local events featuring thought-provoking speakers.

WIT is having a full day Pre-Congress Workshop on Saturday, June 30th at TTS 2018 in Madrid. WIT is also well represented in the TTS 2018 Congress program. There is a WIT track Morning Symposia entitled, “Sex and Gender Research in Transplantation-Where Are We Now?” on July 2nd as well as a WIT State-Of-The-Art Session entitled “Why Does Sex Matter in Transplantation?” on July 3rd.

The TID 2018 Pre-Congress Workshop will be held immediately prior to the TTS 2018 Congress in Madrid on Sunday July 1st!

The Workshop is aimed primarily at transplant clinicians with an interest in infections and is intended to promote research and education in the prevention, diagnosis, and management of the infectious disease problems of the transplant recipient. The Organ Vigilance session will also be of great interest to regulators and organ procurement professionals.

This year’s full-day program will have some exciting new features, including didactic lectures, Pro & Con sessions, and discussion of challenging clinical cases by 18 physician experts from various continents. In addition to updates on common infectious complications, the Workshop will have sessions focused on donor-derived infection and organ vigilance around the world, controversies in transplant infectious diseases, a review of the top papers in TID, among others. There will also be included a discussion of challenging clinical cases to ensure an educational, entertaining, and fun TID 2018 Pre-Congress Workshop.

Please join us for an excellent opportunity to meet colleagues from all over the world, increase your network of TID friends, and interact with respected TID specialists. TID officers and councilors are looking forward to welcoming all to a wonderful conference in Madrid!