WELCOME NOTE

Dear Colleagues,

It is already 18 months since the COVID-19 pandemic has attached our world. The pandemic is a constant natural pressure that leads to important adaptations. One salient adaptation is the need to secure the continuing medical education. The conference of the European Shock Society could not remain unaffected by this situation. The persistence of the pandemic under the prevail of the delta variant led the steering committee to decide that the conference of 2021 should be held under a virtual web platform.

Our everyday difficulties impose the need to become better. With this modo, we have decided to efficiently use the web opportunities and offer to you a conference fully different that previous years trying to make it attractive mainly to younger colleagues. Major changes are a) the inclusion of short slots of presentations by world leaders in the field; b) the integration of basic, translational and clinical research, c) the widening to other societies including the sister Shock societies, the Global Sepsis Alliance and the European Sepsis Alliance but also to the European sepsis research consortium ImmunoSep; d) the use of one web-platform that allows in parallel interaction between attendees in private rooms; and e) the publication of the presentations as a supplement in the journal Shock.

All members of the steering committee hope that our web conference will meet your demands for medical education but it will also keep alive the need of constant communication between scientists.

Prof. Evangelos J. Giamarellos-Bourboulis, MD, PhD
President of the European Shock Society

Andrea Szabó, MD, PhD
General Secretary of the European Shock Society