Wednesday 11 June 2014

Gearing up for ECFS

Four members of staff from the Cystic Fibrosis Trust have travelled to Sweden in order to attend the European Cystic Fibrosis Society's annual conference, to meet,engage and collaborate with colleagues from across the continent in the fight to beat cystic fibrosis for good. Over the coming days we will be bringing you updates from those there. Starting us off is Dr Janet Allen, Director of Research & Care.

It’s June so that means it is ECFS – the major European meeting for cystic fibrosis. The conference, which this year takes place in Gothenburg, Sweden, starts properly tomorrow with an opening plenary session. The following days are packed with sessions from first thing in the morning through to the evening, until Saturday afternoon.


I arrived a day early to represent the Cystic Fibrosis Trust on behalf of Ed Owen at a strategic meeting of all the cystic fibrosis organisations across Europe. ECFS is an excellent opportunity to meet colleagues from these organisation to see how we can work better together and maximise the opportunity to secure European funds to benefit cystic fibrosis research. The EU research programmes are run on a seven-year cycle and last year, the EU published its blueprint research strategy 2014-2020. This time, the EU has been a bit more adventurous in its title and instead of being called ‘Framework 8’, this strategy is titled ’Horizon 2020‘, which perhaps reflects a more aspirational view for research. It is important that we work together to improve the chances of securing part of the EU research budget, which , although enormous, covers all aspects of science and medicine. It was good to hear of the plans of the other cystic fibrosis organisations and see the opportunities for a combined assault on Brussels. It was also great to have an update on the European Clinical Trials Network. This network links large cystic fibrosis centres in five countries in Europe – sharing knowledge and experience to review trial protocols to try to troubleshoot before the trial starts recruiting.

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