Cancer Research UK-International Oesophageal Cancer Symposium 2019 Convener: Professor Rebecca Fitzgerald The International Symposium on oesophageal cancer has now become a bi-annual event and this year’s conference was held in London at the Royal Institution which was an inspiring venue. The audience was truly international and represented a diverse range of interests and included students as well as senior scientists and clinicians from academia and industry. The conference started with a thought provoking talk from Imran Haque entitled “We are legion”. Imran is not from the Oesophageal cancer field but he lived up to his reputation and provoked the audience to think outside the box and considered the merits of a mechanistic versus an empirical approach for making new scientific discoveries. He also introduced us to the interactive Q&A tool called slide which proved to be a great way of engaging with the audience throughout the conference which had lots of time for discussion built into the schedule. Over the two days we covered: epidemiology including the African perspective; a session on cellular molecular drivers of the disease; how to build a more robust translational pipeline; development of new therapies; the tumour microenvironment and last but not least early detection and prevention. A highlight was the future leaders’ session which brimmed with enthusiasm and there was much discussion over the posters especially at the drinks reception. I think that everyone would agree that it was a highly inspiring and stimulating event which brought new perspectives from outside as well as from within the field and the patient perspective was a stark reminder of the importance of research into this disease. We are very grateful to Cancer Research UK for their support - without which this symposium would not have been possible. I do you hope that you find the contents of this newsletter helpful; it is worth mentioning that the comments section represent my own views and not a formal AUGIS stance. Finally, I wish you all a lovely summer. Ashraf Rasheed OG Benign Lead References; 1 Jankowski JA. Barrett esophagus and surveillance in the United Kingdom. Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2009;5(11):766-8 2 Jankowski J, Barr H, Wang K, Delaney B. Diagnosis and management of Barrett’s oesophagus. BMJ. 2010;341:c4551 3 Wild CP, Hardie LJ. Reflux, Barrett’s oesophagus and adenocarcinoma: burning questions. Nat Rev Cancer. 2003;3(9):676-84 4 DynaMed. Barrett esophagus. Ipswich (MA): EBSCO Publishing; 2012. 5 Sikkema M, de Jonge PJ, Steyerberg EW, Kuipers EJ. Risk of esophageal adenocarcinoma and mortality in patients with Barrett’s esophagus: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Clin Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2010;8(3):235-44 You can read the full report at: www.augis.org/report-from-the-og-lead AUGIS Summer 2019 Newsletter 14 Report from the Lead for Non-Malignant OG Disease AUGIS Summer 2019 Newsletter 15 AUGIS 2019 Annual Scientific Meeting, Liverpool Wednesday morning will commence with the AUGIS AHP and CNS dedicated sessions, then at 1.30pm the main meeing will commence with key note talks including David Sellu speaking on medical manslaughter, a session on emergency upper GI surgery and AUGIS prize papers.The day will end with a symposium looking at the impact of the recent pension changes. Thursday will have three all day parallel streams; benign OG and bariatrics, malignant OG and HPB and each stream will include a trainee session, free papers, and sessions for both the specialist and generalist. Friday morning we come back together for two plenary sessions.The first examines how to cope with the pressures of surgery and its impact on work and life balance.The final session addresses important biliary issues that affect us all. We hope to see you all in Liverpool, 25 - 27 September 2019. www.augis.org/2019conference Awarded 14 CPD/CME points by the ASGBI