Tomorrow's medicines: key programme talks announced for EACPT Stockholm Congess 29 June - 2 July 2019

The next EACPT Congress will be held from 29th June to 2nd July in 2019 in Stockholm as a partnership between the EACPT and the Swedish Society for Pharmacology, Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics.

Early bird registration deadline - 10th April 2019.  Register online for the 2019 EACPT Congress in Stockholm

The Congress will address Tomorrow's Healthcare Challenges and will be held at the City Conference Centre - 5 minutes from Stockholm Central Station.

The Congress Reception on the evening of Saturday 29th June, will be held at Stockholm City Hall, the venue of the Nobel Prize banquet.

The Keynote Opening Lecture will be given by the President at the Karolinska Institute, Professor Ole Petter Ottersen, on global health and clinical pharmacology.

Professor Urs Meyer from Switzerland will give the 2019 EACPT Lifetime Achievement Award Lecture based on his work on individual variation in drug response.

Further awards will be presented, including Scientific Awards, including Young Investigator, and EACPT Education Awards.

Around 60 invited speakers are expected from throughout Europe and beyond. Congress keynote lectures will include:

Plenary lectures

Ylva Böttiger:  Clinical pharmacology reaching out - 25 years with EACPT

Ole Petter Ottersen:  Global health research and education in Europe - how can clinical pharmacology contribute?

Harry Sokol:  Gut microbiota - a new actor in pharmacology?

Urs Meyer:  Therapeutic Lessons from Human Individuality

Rosa Giuliani:  Update on treating breast cancer

Jenny Kindblom:  Pediatric clinical trials and their pitfalls 

Tim Nicholson:  New targets in psychopharmacology

Sylvie Laporte:  Meta-epidemiological studies to detect, quantify and adjust for bias in open-label trials

Stefan James:  Innovative ways of performing clinical trials

Björn Wettermark:  How to measure drug utilisation

Cardiovascular prevention

Stephane Laurent:  Update on treating hypertension

Gerard Rongen:  PCSK9 inhibitors - going lower but for whom and at what price? Paul Hjemdahl:  Dual or triple antithrombotic therapy - is two company and three a crowd?

An ageing population

Denis O'Mahoney:  STOPP/START decision support for elderly prescribing

Anne Spinewine:  Prescribing in the frail elderly

 

Workshops

Martin Henriksson:  How to perform a health economic study 

Olof Beck and Markus Meyer: How to measure drug exposure

Jan Marcusson:  How to make on oral presentation and feel good about it

Closing the money gap

Gerd Lärfars:  Horizon scanning frontiers

Andras Inotai:  How to solve money gap to ensure patient access to pharmaceuticals in EU counties

David Webb:  Health economics: big ideas from a small country

Personalized medicine : joint EACPT-EPHAR session

Henk Jan Guchelaar:  Clinical implementation of pharmacogenetics

Viktor Hlavac:  Pharmacogenetics of cancer chemoresistance

Seppo Ylä-Herttuala:  Cardiovascular gene therapy

Martina Schusler-Lenz:  Advanced therapy regulation in the EU

Interprofessional working

Ann Lykkegaard Sørensen:  Interprofessional approach for safer medication in psychiatry

Hanna Seidling:  Benchmarks for successful interdisciplinary collaboration

Debate: Deprescribing is Dangerous

Jamie Coleman:  For; Wade Thompson : Against

Targeting small populations

Caridad Pontes:  barriers to market access, 

Violeta Stoyanova:  drug designation and other regulatory challenges

Critically ill patients

Dario Cattaneo:  Anti-infectives in intensive care

Philippe Vignon:  New sepsis drugs in the pipeline: any reason for hope?

Christoph Stein:  New concepts in opioid analgesia

Antibiotic drug resistance

Johan Mouton:  Antimicrobial resistance. Could PK/PD be the answer?

Alexandra Aubry:  New treatment options for resistent tuberculosis

Polypharmacy: joint session with the Korean Society

Howard Lee:  Polypharmacy in Korea

Ho Sook Kim:  The clinical pharmacology perspectives for the optimal polypharmacy in Korea

Kees Kramers:  Polypharmacy: Acting on the cutting edge of safety, efficacy and compliance

Patient empowerment

Bettina Ryll:  Patient empowerment: Issues with introduction of a new class of drugs

Ann Langius Eklöf:  Smart phones provide smart patients

2020 drug strategy

Jordi Llinares:  achievements and future initiatives; Drug regulation in the 2020s:  Gonzalo Calvo: an academic perspective; Graziella Collu: a pharmaceutical industry perspective

Decision support

Matthew Doogue:  Alert, clinical decision support helping patients and hindering work flow

Lars L Gustafsson:  Clinical pharmacologists with computers - the way forward

2019 EACPT Lifetime Achievement Award to go to Professor Urs Meyer from Switzerland

The EACPT is delighted to announce that the 2019 Lifetime Achievement Award of the European Association of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics will go to Professor Urs Meyer from Switzerland.

The Award, which includes the EACPT silver medal, will be presented to Professor Meyer during the 2019 EACPT congress in Stockholm which is being held from 29 June to 2 July 2019.

To register for the congress and attend Professor Meyer's Lifetime Award Lecture click on eacpt2019.org 

Urs A. Meyer went through a remarkable career as physician and scientist whose discoveries and scientific results have fundamentally contributed to clinical pharmacology and its development in recent decades.

His research has focused on “pharmacological individuality” or person-to-person variation of drug response throughout his career, from studying the drug sensitivity of the pharmacogenetic disease porphyria to the pharmacogenomics of drug disposition and its co-regulation by drug interactions and environmental factors. 

These predictable variations in drug response are important components of individualized drug therapy or personalized and stratified medicine. Urs Meyer probably is best known for the discovery of the molecular mechanisms of several common genetic polymorphisms of drug disposition. His laboratory identified the genes and mutations in these genes causing variation in drug response and developed the first pharmacogenetic DNA tests, initially for the genes now called CYP2D6 and NAT2. The publications describing these genetic variations in drug response in Nature, PNAS, Lancet, etc. are some of the most cited papers in the therapeutic literature. 

At that time they transformed the field of pharmacogenetics into a molecular science. Urs Meyer’s group was engaged and productive in a further type of inter-individual variation of drug response, namely the transcriptional activation or repression of numerous genes, including many drug metabolizing enzymes and drug transporters, by exogenous and endogenous factors. His laboratory has discovered important early steps in the recognition mechanisms for these factors in cells and the consequent signal transfer to the nucleus.  This is an area of great clinical importance with regard to understanding inter-individual variations in the therapeutic and toxic effects of drugs. 

Urs Meyer takes care of most of the porphyria families in Switzerland and in several surrounding countries. Focusing on the pharmacogenetic disease porphyria and its unsolved syndrome of neuropsychiatric symptoms Urs Meyer’s team has developed an animal model of this pharmacogenetic disease, imitating the human defect. These mice have a phenotype closely resembling the human disorder and are presently used in several laboratories to develop new therapeutic approaches to the treatment of inducible acute porphyria.

Sustained productivity across the domains of basic and clinical pharmacology has resulted in over 340 original publications, reviews and book chapters. Urs Meyer has been listed since 2001 within the exclusive ISI’s Highly Cited Researchers database. His publications have been cited over 30,000 times and his H-index is 93. Urs Meyer’s scientific achievements have also has been recognized by numerous awards and honours, including the Rawls-Palmer Award for Progress in Medicine of the American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics and the RT Williams Distinguished Scientific Achievement Award of the International Society for the Study of Xenobiotics – among many others.

Beyond the laboratory and patient care, Urs Meyer has maintained a strong commitment to the teaching of rational therapeutics to medical students and to training programmes in drug development sciences, e.g. within the European Center for Pharmaceutical Medicine ECPM courses in science-based drug development. He has trained 71 graduate students and 62 post-doctoral fellows and more than 35 of his previous collaborators are now in academic positions all over the world. A number of scientists, of whom 9 from the USA, have spent time as sabbatical professors in the laboratory of Urs Meyer.

Urs Meyer also has assumed leadership roles at the international level, including the WHO and NIH. He has served on numerous peer review panels and editorial boards, presently as Associate Editor of Annual Reviews of Pharmacology and Toxicology. He was the inaugural Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Personalized Medicine in 2011. As an example of his international activities, he was selected to present the Pharmacogenomics Research Network PGRN to the NIH Council in 2000 and was a member of the External Scientific Panel for this program. He also was president of the International Society for the Study of Xenobiotics (ISSX) 2010-2011, with offices in Washington, D.C.

The EACPT was founded 25 years ago and now includes as members all national organisations for clinical pharmacology in Europe, as well as organisations from further afield internationally. The EACPT aims to provide educational and scientific support for the more than 4000 individual professionals interested in clinical pharmacology and therapeutics throughout the European region, with its congresses attended by a global audience. The EACPT also advises policy makers on how the specialty can contribute to human health and wealth.

The official journal of the EACPT is the European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. 

Pharmacogenetics in clinical practice discussed at EACPT Madrid Congress

Implementation of pharmacogenetics and personalised medicine in clinical practice was the focus of one of the key sessions of the EACPT Congress in Madrid. In this video, Matthias Schwab (Germany), Edoardo Spina (Italy), Marja-Liisa Dahl (Sweden), Adrián LLerena (Spain) and Ingolf Cascorbi (Germany) discuss pharmacogenetics in clinical practice from a healthcare perspective, clinical vs. business need and pharmacoeconomic evaluation of pharmacogenomics in healthcare systems.   

Listen to the panel discuss pharmacogenetics.


The 12th biennial Congress of the European Association for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics (http://eacpt.eu) was held  in Madrid from 27th to 30th June 2015. Over 500 abstracts were accepted from 66 countries and from all 5 continents for presentation as e-posters and oral presentations. The 54 oral presentations were eligible for awards for  best talks. 

2015 EACPT Lifetime Award winner Michel Eichelbaum discusses pharmacogenetics at the Madrid Congress

Professor Tabassome Simon with Professor Michel Eichelbaum

The 12th biennial Congress of the European Association for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics (http://eacpt.eu) is underway in Madrid from 27th to 30th June 2015. Over 500 abstracts have been accepted from 66 countries and form all 5 continents for presentation as e-posters and oral presentations. the 54 oral presentations are eligible for an award for the best talk. 

Hear new EACPT chair Professor Tabassome Simon in discussion with 2015 EACPT  Lifetime Award winner Professor Michel Eichelbaum about the importance and some of the challenges of applying pharmacogenetics to clinical practice.




Michel Eichelbaum is one of the most cited pharmacologists in in the world. He has published nearly 500 articles, reviews and book chapters and numerous abstracts, and his work has been cited over 25,000 times by other authors. His primary research interest has been the pharmacogenetics of drug metabolizing enzymes and transporter proteins. He was also one of the pioneers of studying various aspects of the stereochemistry of drugs, the use of stable isotopes in clinical pharmacology and intestinal metabolism and transport of drugs. 

In 1975, he discovered a genetic polymorphism in the oxidation of the antiarrhythmic and oxytocic drug, sparteine, which later became known as CYP2D6 polymorphism. This is considered his single most important scientific discovery. Later, he became involved in research on factors involved in the regulation of drug-metabolizing enzymes and transporters with special emphasis on nuclear receptors. This basic research is supplemented by clinical studies in oncology with special emphasis on breast cancer treatment, HIV, psychiatry and organ transplantation in which the consequences of genetic polymorphisms of these proteins for drug effects and toxicity are explored.

He was born in Leipzig on 19 May 1941. He studied medicine at the University of Heidelberg between 1960 and 1966, and he defended his doctoral thesis at this University in 1968. During 1966 to 1968, he was an intern in Internal Medicine, Surgery and Gynaecology and Obstetrics. Between 1968 and1976, he was a resident in Internal Medicine at University Hospitals of Giessen and Bonn. From 1976-1985, he was attending physician and Associate Professor of Internal Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology at the Department of Medicine, University of Bonn.

He is a specialist in both Clinical Pharmacology and in Internal Medicine. From 1985 and 21 years onwards, he was the Director of the Dr. Margarete Fischer-Bosch Institute of Clinical Pharmacology, Stuttgart, Germany. Simultaneously, he was Professor and Chairman of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Tübingen, and in 2001 he became Adjunct Professor at the University of Adelaide, Australia.

During his career, Michel Eichelbaum has obtained several Research Fellowships. During 1970-1971, he worked in the Laboratory of Chemical Pharmacology, National Heart and Lung Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA, together with Drs. B.B. Brodie and J.R. Gillette. From 1973-1974, he was working at the Department of Clinical Pharmacology, Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, together with Professor Folke Sjöqvist, and from 1995-1996 he was a Visiting Professor at the Department of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacology, University of Adelaide, Australia. Michel Eichelbaum has received numerous awards and honours. This year, he was honoured with the Oscar B. Hunter Memorial Award in Therapeutics from the American Society of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics. He is the third European to receive this prize. 

The EACPT was founded 22 years ago and now includes as members all national organisations for clinical pharmacology in Europe, as well as organisations from further afield internationally. The EACPT aims to provide educational and scientific support for the more than 4000 individual professionals interested in clinical pharmacology and therapeutics throughout the European region, with its congresses attended by a global audience. The EACPT also advises policy makers on how the specialty can contribute to human health and wealth.

Congress scientific chair Cristina Avendaño discussing the EACPT Madrid conference

Cristina Avendaño

Around 800 delegates are now in Madrid for the  12th biennial Congress of the European Association for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics which is being held from 27th to 30th June 2015. 

Over 500 abstracts have been accepted from 66 countries from all 5 continents for presentation as e-posters and oral presentations.

In this recording at the start of the Congress, Cristina Avendaño, Chair of the Congress Scientific Committee and Chair of the Spanish Society for Clinical Pharmacology  discusses her hopes for this important international event with EACPT Secretary Donald Singer.

2015 EACPT Lifetime Achievement Award to go to Professor Michel Eichelbaum

We are delighted to announce that the 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award of the European Association of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics will go to Professor Michel Eichelbaum for his outstanding contribution to the national and international benefits of clinical pharmacology for medicine, health care and patient safety.

The Award, which includes the EACPT silver medal, will be presented to Professor Eichelbaum during the 12th EACPT Congress in Madrid on Saturday 27th June 2015.

Michel Eichelbaum is one of the most cited pharmacologists in in the world. He has published

Professor Michel Eichelbaum

nearly 500 articles, reviews and book chapters and numerous abstracts, and his work has been cited over 25,000 times by other authors. His primary research interest has been the pharmacogenetics of drug metabolizing enzymes and transporter proteins. He was also one of the pioneers of studying various aspects of the stereochemistry of drugs, the use of stable isotopes in clinical pharmacology and intestinal metabolism and transport of drugs. 

In 1975, he discovered a genetic polymorphism in the oxidation of the antiarrhythmic and oxytocic drug, sparteine, which later became known as CYP2D6 polymorphism. This is considered his single most important scientific discovery. Later, he became involved in research on factors involved in the regulation of drug-metabolizing enzymes and transporters with special emphasis on nuclear receptors. This basic research is supplemented by clinical studies in oncology with special emphasis on breast cancer treatment, HIV, psychiatry and organ transplantation in which the consequences of genetic polymorphisms of these proteins for drug effects and toxicity are explored.

He was born in Leipzig on 19 May 1941. He studied medicine at the University of Heidelberg between 1960 and 1966, and he defended his doctoral thesis at this University in 1968. During 1966 to 1968, he was an intern in Internal Medicine, Surgery and Gynaecology and Obstetrics. Between 1968 and1976, he was a resident in Internal Medicine at University Hospitals of Giessen and Bonn. From 1976-1985, he was attending physician and Associate Professor of Internal Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology at the Department of Medicine, University of Bonn.

He is a specialist in both Clinical Pharmacology and in Internal Medicine. From 1985 and 21 years onwards, he was the Director of the Dr. Margarete Fischer-Bosch Institute of Clinical Pharmacology, Stuttgart, Germany. Simultaneously, he was Professor and Chairman of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Tübingen, and in 2001 he became Adjunct Professor at the University of Adelaide, Australia.

During his career, Michel Eichelbaum has obtained several Research Fellowships. During 1970-1971, he worked in the Laboratory of Chemical Pharmacology, National Heart and Lung Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA, together with Drs. B.B. Brodie and J.R. Gillette. From 1973-1974, he was working at the Department of Clinical Pharmacology, Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, together with Professor Folke Sjöqvist, and from 1995-1996 he was a Visiting Professor at the Department of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacology, University of Adelaide, Australia. Michel Eichelbaum has received numerous awards and honours. This year, he was honoured with the Oscar B. Hunter Memorial Award in Therapeutics from the American Society of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics. He is the third European to receive this prize. 

The EACPT was founded 22 years ago and now includes as members all national organisations for clinical pharmacology in Europe, as well as organisations from further afield internationally. The EACPT aims to provide educational and scientific support for the more than 4000 individual professionals interested in clinical pharmacology and therapeutics throughout the European region, with its congresses attended by a global audience. The EACPT also advises policy makers on how the specialty can contribute to human health and wealth.

Update on 28-31 August 2013 EACPT Congress in Geneva

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The abstract deadline for the next biennial EACPT Congress is only 6 weeks away: 8th April 2013.
See the EACPT Congress blog for summaries on many of the symposia to be held during the Congress: from new therapeutic biomarkers, to new biomarker and treatment targets (cancer, eye disease, predictive pharmacogenetics, inborn errors of metabolism, therapeutic drug monitoring ...), and how to improve safety in prescribing ...

The Congress will be held at the International Congress Centre of Geneva from 28 to 31 August 2013. 

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Over 900 participants are expected to attend including health professionals, scientists, policy makers, biotechnology and pharmaceutical professionals and others with an interest in basic and clinical pharmacology, pharmacotherapy, drug discovery and development, regulatory affairs and related areas.

Abstract submission

Registration

2013 EACPT Geneva Congress website.

Strategy development for the EACPT

EC members from UK, Sweden, Croatia and Italy

The European Association for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics provides expert advice for European policy makers and medicines agencies, and organises congresses and workshops providing key information on the latest advances in research, education and policy on drug development and on the efficacy and safety of new and established medicines and their management. The EACPT  provides important additional support for its members, including representation and advocacy, training, and other aspects of development of the specialty.

EC members from France, Holland, Denmark, Finland and Germany

The international landscape for learned medical societies is evolving rapidly as a result of several key factors, including the impact of advances in molecular technology on drug discovery and development, changes in populations demographics, emergence of new therapeutic challenges,  the current global economic climate, and the effects of new e-technologies on ways of working and interacting for health and industry professionals, researchers and other interested in clinical sciences.

EC members from Holland, Spain, Germany & Hungary

The EACPT Executive Committee is in the process of conducting one of its regular strategy reviews, including evaluation of opportunities for the Assocation and its communities arising from the above developments. Results and actions arising from the strategy review will be discussed at the next biennial EACPT Congress to be held in Geneva 28-31 August 2013.

More on the EACPT Geneva 2013 Congress.

Update from Geneva

The latest meeting of the EACPT Executive has just finished in Geneva in advance of the next major EACPT biennial congress, which is to be held in this lakeside Swiss city in the summer of 2013.

Here are three important updates about the EACPT's scientific and educational programmes:

The next EACPT summer school will be held on 23rd to 25th August 2012 in Amsterdam, with an excellent range of topics for delegates interested in education in key principles relevant to clinical pharmacology. See the website for further information.

At the next European Pharmacology Congress in Granada  July 17th - 20th, 2012,  EACPT Vice-President Professor Tabassome Simon from Paris will give the keynote EACPT lecture on the application of pharmacogenetic testing to cardiovascular therapeutics.

Cathedral and Lake Geneva fountain (jet d'eau)

The EACPT is developing the programme for its next biennial congress, to be held in beautiful Geneva, 28th - 31st August in 2013. Key themes at the congress will range from bedside pharmacology for special patient groups to pharmacology & toxicology, and pharmacology and society. Specific topics will include advances in personalised diagnostics to improve the safety and effectiveness of medicines, updates on new biological approaches to ocular disease, therapeutics of cardiovascular, cancer and inflammatory disease, clinical trial design and regulation, and drug safety and toxicology.