ISDE at UEG Week 2015

Written by Giovanni Zanintto

13,200 delegates from all over the world took part in the United European Gastroenterological Week in Barcelona from 24 to 28 October, by far the most attended European meeting on digestive diseases. Among the hot topics of the congress were Barrett’s esophagus and the treatment of early esophageal cancer, eosinophilic esophagitis and esophageal motility disorders. Here are some brief comments and impressions on the meeting.

The decision if low-risk Barrett  should be treated or leaved was debated between Raf Bisschops and Prateek Sharma, with the latter in favour of eradicating non dysplastic Barrett;  the predictive role of endoscopy imaging and biomarkers was analyzed in a session chaired by Rebecca Fitzgerald.

Another topic was eosinophilic esophagitis: Javier Molina-Infante from Spain was awarded the “Rising Star” prize for his works to identify a subgroup of EE responding to PPI even in the absence of reflux disease. 

Two interesting symposia on advances imaging in GI function and on dilemmas in GORD were chaired by Professors Tack and Sifrim: in the first Prof Aziz presented his recent studies on functional brain imaging and Mark Fox updated on HRM, in the second Andre Smout soke on GERD refractory to PPI and Janet Wilson on the role of reflux on ear, nose and throat disorders.

The role of Heller myotomy and POEM were debated in a symposium on functional dysphagia lead by Prof Inoue and Straumann.

Just inside the entrance to the associations’ area the ISDE banner and Andreas Hinnerth were well positioned. The ISDE booth attracted a lot of people who showed interest in our society and in the next meeting to be held in Singapore in 2016.

Last update: November 3, 2015