PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE


May 18, 2009

Dear ISSHP Member

It is fitting for a new president to congratulate and thank his immediate predecessor, in this case Professor Chris Redman, for his outstanding guidance of the Society, which was crowned by the excellent congress in Washington DC, organized by Dr Jason Umans and his team. I also wish to offer a special word of thanks to the past Secretary/Treasurer Professor Eric Steegers, for his very able management in a sometimes hectic period. I am also very pleased to welcome Dr Gerda Zeeman as the new Secretary/Treasurer of the Society.

Our eyes are currently turned towards to the coming events, notably the activities by local branches of the ISSHP. We are looking forward to the coming European ISSHP meeting in Oxford on 10-13 September 2009, which will include a celebration of our former president Professor Chris Redman. Recently a new Brazilian branch was started by Professor Nelson Sass of the University of Sao Paulo. I wish the new ISSHP branch a lot of success and look forward to hearing about their activities.

Meanwhile we are looking forward to our next world congress which will be held in sunny Melbourne, Australia, on 3-6 October 2010, which is being organized by the able hands of Professor Shaun Brennecke and his team. The next European ISSHP meeting will be organized in Sorrento (Italy) on 14-17 September 2011 by Professor Andrea Tranquilli and the Associazione Italiana Preeclampsia. Concerning the 2012 world congress Professor Wolfgang Holzgreve is already taking the first steps to welcome us in Genève, Switzerland.

As to the future activities of the Society, I think that the main emphasis should remain on stimulating research in the field of hypertension in pregnancy, the very idea that stood on the cradle of the society when it was founded in 1976. An important role of our Society is to offer an optimal platform for interaction between investigators. I see three ways how we might try to optimize the facilities currently offered by the Society:

(1)Travel grants for participating to our biennial congresses. It is obviously very important to draw young investigators to our meetings, and we should try to increase the number of grants in the near future.

(2)The Journal. In recent years the impact factor has increased, but I think it can even go up further. Therefore I wish to encourage investigators to publish the results presented in our meetings in Hypertension in Pregnancy. The current editors of the journal, Professor Fiona Lyall and Dr Peter von Dadelszen, are working on several initiatives which may attract a wider readership. Any ideas from our members are very welcome! In particular if you have an idea for a review you would like to write, the editors are always delighted to hear from you.

(3)The website. The information content of the website needs to expand. Not only activities of the different branches of the Society should be advertised, but also information on meetings of related fields of interest (meetings concerning other pregnancy-related problems in nephrology, cardiology, hypertension, fetal and placental development) might be provided on the website.


Since the membership has been steadily increasing in recent years, I see a brilliant future for our Society.





Robert Pijnenborg

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