Dear Colleagues,
EuroIntervention, as you are aware, is an official publication, an integral part of EuroPCR and the EAPCI, an association of the ESC. This places us in an interesting and pivotal position, not just in the diffusion of information and ideas, but the responsibility that this communication reflects the highest level of international research and practice... for our readers and members of EAPCI in Europe, as well as our many collaborators and readership worldwide.
We cannot do this alone. To effectively be in contact with this global venture, we must have the participation of those who are working regionally, as well as internationally. They come to our meetings, they share in our research, as we share in theirs... they are our friends and our associates... Together we advance medicine and our speciality, and now we come to them and ask their advice and collaboration to further the aims of this journal to provide the best in our field, wherever, and whenever it occurs.
It is for this reason that we are pleased and honoured to introduce you to our two new international editors, Seung-Jung Park for the Pacific Rim and Alexandre Abizaid for Latin America.
For eight years now the Asian Pacific Society of Interventional Cardiology (APSIC) has been a vital force in world cardiology, and its current chair, and our new international editor, Seung-Jung Park is well known to most of you reading this journal. Educated in Korea, a fellow in Texas in the United States, he has been a frequent contributor to EuroPCR and European medicine. Professor of Medicine at the University of Ulsan College of Medicine Cardiac Centre, Asan Medical Centre in Korea, Seung-Jung Park has almost 400 publications to his name, 200 alone in the international press, he will be an active participant in our journal and we are excited to have him.
Alexandre Abizaid, is also well known to our readership, as well as being the current President of Sociedad Latinoamericana de Cardiologia Intervencionista (SOLACI), the organisation for Latin America interventionalists.
Long an active participant in Europe, both in publications and participation in our meetings, Alexandre Abizaid is a leader his field, Chief of Coronary Interventions at the Institute Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia in São Paulo, Brazil, and a Visiting Professor of Medicine at Columbia University Medical Centre in New York City, USA. He has conducted several first-in-man studies, one of which is published in this current issue.
Both individually, and as heads of their different associations, these two respected colleagues will be an essential and invigorating addition to our editorial board. They will be equally assisted by Pedro Lemos for Latin America and Andrew Ong for the Pacific Rim.
And we are still growing, evolving, responding to the needs of the community as our publication matures and expands. In the next few months, I will be announcing other international editors, from North America, Africa and the Near East, but already today – though we remain totally integrated with EuroPCR and the EAPCI – smaller international gatherings are turning to us as a forum for their ideas. In this regard, we are pleased with the focus articles in this edition of EuroIntervention highlighting the 4th International Conference on Cell Therapy, that recently took place in New York (USA) and the Innovations in Cardiovascular Interventions (ICI), which was held last December in Tel Aviv, Israel.
We evolve also by responding to what interests us all. Judging from the intensity of web traffic for the editorial in the last issue entitled “Have we misled by the ESC DES firestorm?” (Cook and Meier) we have chosen to continue addressing the issue again here, by inviting some of the key European specialists among you to respond why – and why not – they would continue to use bare metal stents today.
So begins another edition of our journal.
But as I said at the beginning of this editorial, we cannot do this alone or in a vacuum. It is not just these international associations or major players in the field that count for us, it is you, our readership... and though I know I say this in each editorial, I cannot emphasise it enough: Submit – online, with our Resumé system – write to us with your comments, join us in our session at EuroPCR and in our associations... Participate, because only together can we continue to grow, and truly advance.
