The 39th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Association for Chest Surgery

Norihiko Ikeda, MD, PhD. Congress President
Professor and Chairman,
Department of Surgery, Tokyo Medical University

Due to the disruptions caused by the novel coronavirus, I can imagine the hardships that members of the Japanese Association for Chest Surgery have had to endure this past year. I would like to pay tribute to the efforts of Presidents Endo and Nagayasu for holding the 37th and 38th annual meetings of this society under such difficult circumstances over the past 2 years.
To emulate the spirit, the 39th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Association for Chest Surgery will be held on May 20th (Friday) and 21st (Saturday), 2022, at Grand Nikko Tokyo Daiba.
In recent years, in the field of chest surgery, thoracoscopic surgery has become widely accepted with expanded coverage. Robot-assisted surgery is now also covered by insurance, and hopefully remote surgery will soon start due to advances in equipment and communication environment. The results of a large-scale clinical trial showing the results of limited surgery for early-stage lung cancer have also been reported, attracting attention worldwide.
Many clinical trials have been conducted for perioperative treatment using immune checkpoint inhibitors and molecular-targeted therapies and promising results have been obtained. I strongly feel that the results of collaboration with basic medicine and engineering will immediately be introduced into clinical practice. The theme of this meeting is "Toward a new frontier". We stand in a privileged situation where it is possible to acquire important knowledge and skills from a wide range of studies. We hope that you will acquire the comprehensive skills along with your areas of interest in chest surgery to reach a higher level of the "new frontier".
The program covers notable content and issues for discussion. In particular, we have set up a plan for leading experts to give lectures on contents that I personally would like to emphasize, and that will become mainstream in the near future.
We will do our best to give participants the opportunity to communicate and absorb much knowledge at the 39th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Association for Chest Surgery. I wish you all the best and look forward to seeing you at the venue and on the web.