Annual report 2017

EDITORIAL 2017 ANNUAL REPORT

Another year has flown by and what a busy year it was for ESTRO. This annual report gives you a strong sense of the Society’s persistence in expanding and improving its array of activities in 2017, highlighting many of the remarkable achievements from the year. I hope you enjoy reading it. It is striking that yet again ESTRO membership has increased, a clear indication that we deliver quality educational and scientific programmes valued by professionals in radiation oncology. Another contributing factor is the attractiveness of the structured and diversified membership categories that we offer. Of significance here is the new membership model, the ESTRO RTT Alliance, which launched in 2017. The Alliance aims to achieve better recognition of the radiation therapists’ (RTT) profession at both the political level of oncopolicy and in the treatment of cancer patients. Our annual conference, ESTRO36, whichwas held in Vienna, Austria, in May 2017, confirmed the meeting as the premier platform for networking and finding state-of-the-art and breaking news on radiation oncology.We again saw a steady increase in participation across the board at both individual and industry level. ESTRO also collaborated with other oncology societies on topical/ organ-based multidisciplinary meetings, including EMUC, ICHNO and ELCC, as well as on non-organ-based meetings, such as the European Cancer Congress. All these meetings underscore interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approaches to improving cancer care. Closer to home, ESTRO continues to encourage and facilitate scientific and professional networking opportunities within ESTRO sub- specialties via workshops. Workshops held by our

physicists and brachytherapists were particularly successful. The Society’s flagship journal, Radiotherapy & Oncology, welcomed six new editors in 2017. It was also the first year in which we witnessed the contribution of our three new open-access journals: Clinical and Translational Radiation Oncology (ctRO); Physics and Imaging for Radiation Oncology (phiRO); and Technical Innovations and Patient Support in Radiation Oncology (tipsRO). You will find out more about these exciting developments and other ESTRO publications in this annual report. The ESTRO School’s catalogue of courses is continuously developed to maintain its quality, ensuring that the courses meet the needs of ESTRO members and incorporate the latest technology. One notable example is the use of the FALCON platform in not only live, blended and e-learning courses, but also in other activities such as research and the development of guidelines. The net of ESTRO’s public affairs activities is steadily being cast wider, ensuring that stakeholders are empowered with the necessary information to advocate for radiation oncology at the European level. The high point of these activities was towards the end of 2017 when a workshop on health economics in radiation oncology (HERO) concluded with a policy symposium at the European Parliament. Another significant development was the ESTRO Cancer Foundation’s (ECF) launch of the Marie Curie Legacy Campaign, which pitched positive stories to the media about the 150th anniversary of Marie Curie’s birth to raise awareness with the

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EDITORIAL