Welcome message

Dear colleagues and friends,

Following the success of the ESGO International meetings, and in the spirit of ESGO’s mission and objectives in education, ESGO organize educational conferences in the year between the Biennial ESGO International Meetings called ´ESGO State of the Art Conference´. These Meetings focus on post graduate education and are dedicated to one specific topic in gynaecological cancer treatment and care.

It is a great pleasure to present you the third ESGO State of the Art Conference:
Rare Gynaecological Malignancies held on October 4 – 6, 2018 in Lyon, France.

ESGO decided to support a task force dedicated to rare gynaecological cancers, which comprise 50% of the tumours in our population. This has come about as a result of a number of activities that have occurred in rare gynaecological cancers over the last 5 years.  These include EU-commissioned research programmes dedicated to Rare Cancers (European Cancer Patient Coalition, RARECARE), the publication of 20 consensus papers on selected rare gynaecological cancers by 36 worldwide national groups within the GCIG in 2014 and the recently EU-supported network (EURACAN) dedicated to rare adult cancers. Additionally, ENGOT is establishing a collaboration between national groups to build up future clinical trials in rare gynaecologic cancers and help bring together national initiatives. Furthermore, it is well-recognised that conduting trials in rare cancers is challenging and there have been several research methodology publications on clinical trial design in these tumours.

In keeping with the above and ESGO´s mission the programme of our 2018 conference will focus on providing the evidence base to diagnose and manage rare gynecological cancers. The multidisciplinary conference will provide comprehensive state-of-the art summaries from key note speakers on specific rare cancers, up to date scientific reviews on biology, biomarkers, preservation of fertility, updated GCIG/ESGO guidelines, discussion of unanswered questions and the design of future clinical trials.

These are topics of great interest for gynaecological surgeons, medical and radiation oncologists, pathologists and general gynaecologists. Together with the distinguished faculty, we anticipate 400-500 delegates will attend this conference.

Unfortunately, little attention has been paid to the topic of rare cancers by physicians, medical societies and governments for many years. By attending ESGO’s educational events you could contribute to improvements in the management of gynaecological malignancies and identification of innovative therapies which remains a social responsibility of our Society.

We look forward to welcoming you to the ESGO State of the Art Conference 2018.

Yours sincerely,