1998 AC meeting in CyprusOne and a half days before the official opening of Medicon '98, the members of the IFMBE Administrative Council (AC) could already feel much of the charm and hospitality of the Cypriot people when the first ordinary council meeting started. The meeting was held near the conference site and almost the whole AC came together including several of the chairmen of the committees, divisions and working groups of the IFMBE. Therefore, we had a good opportunity to discuss important matters about the future work within the Federation. Before this discussion, which was held under the point of reports from the committees, divisions and working groups, we discussed important aspects such as new members, forthcoming conferences and of course the final budget for 1998. As Jean-Pierre Morucci said in his earlier statement, one of the actions he will focus on during his term of office, is to increase the number of member societies. We will take serious actions to promote contacts with societies and organisations, which are presumptive new members. During the meeting, one new application was passed to the Constitutions and Bylaws Committee for examination and contacts with three other countries will be made. During 1999 there will be six conferences in which the IFMBE has some type of sponsorship. Four of these are held in Europe and two in the Asian-Pacific region. People spend a lot of effort organising the conferences and it is a pity that the conferences will be in competition for participants with each other. It would be very worthwhile if organisers could inform the Secretary General and the Webmaster about planned conferences before the final date is decided, so that the time of the conferences would be the best possible. Mladen Poluta put forward his report in which he concluded that the IFMBE is in a sound financial position. Mladen expressed his appreciation to Richard Kirsner for his assistance and advice during the handover of the treasurer's office. He pointed out that the Committees, Divisions and Working Groups should have better financial planning and reporting in the future. He also suggested that the work for the 1999 budget should be drafted by October. One very essential task for the future is to find new sources of income. This matter will certainly be discussed for some time and of course, we appreciate all ideas and suggestions from the membership. The future of the Federation Journal was discussed extensively. The AC members and the invited participants agreed that the IFMBE should do more to promote the Journal. Also, every Member Society should do more to inform their membership about the possibility to subscribe to the Journal at a reduced subscription rate. We will also increase the promotion during the conferences where IFMBE is involved in some way. IFMBE News was discussed both during the AC meeting and during the Secretaries Committee meeting, which followed the AC meeting on Sunday. There is an obvious problem obtaining material for the News but still Niilo Saranummi, the Editor, has succeeded in increasing the number of reviews, comments and other written contributions in the past issues of the News. During the AC meeting, Peter Rolfe expressed his congratulations to Niilo Saranummi for the efforts he had made. IFMBE News is the forum where all members are allowed to report activities in their Societies or to write comments and summaries from their field of interest. It is the members who are responsible for the content of the newsletter of an association and it will never be better than the members will make it. Therefore, it was astonishing to hear criticism of IFMBE News during the Secretaries Committee meeting and later during the conference. In the Secretaries committee meeting, it was stressed that the member societies should be more active in contributing to the contents of the IFMBE News. We also discussed how to improve the information to the members and we concluded that the website should be used more actively. For example, IFMBE News is available through the Federation website (http://www.iupesm.org/ifmbe.html). Its direct web-address is http://ifmbe-news.iee.org/ifmbe-news/. The distribution of information will not be sufficient if I do not know where it should be sent. On the other hand it would certainly facilitate the distribution process if I get some response once in a while. My goal was to have the new IFMBE Directory´98 ready for the MEDICON´98 meeting. Unfortunately, some societies have not responded to my requests of actual address information. However, the Directory´98 will be available on the website shortly and will be distributed to members at the beginning of September. Most of the secretaries are listed with their email addresses and I sincerely hope that we can use email to communicate our ideas and suggestions in the future. During the meetings, it is always nice to meet colleagues and discuss the future of the biomedical and clinical engineering and also to hear stories from the past and get new ideas. I had several very interesting discussions with friends from different parts of the world and I will make use of their point of views and advise I received. I hope that we have the possibility of continuing with this in the future, during forthcoming meetings. It was decided that AC Officers would next meet during the Nordic-Baltic meeting in Tallinn in June 1999. The next meeting for the whole AC will be in Seoul during the Asian-Pacific meeting in September 1999.
These are words taken from the introduction of an information brochure about Cyprus. Indeed, the participants of Medicon '98 could experience the beauty of the landscape, the mildness of the climate and the charm of the people during the conference, and from the first evening in the opening ceremony at the Kourion Theatre. I would like to express my sincere thanks to the organisers of Medicon '98 for all the help I received in arranging the AC meeting. Secretary General | ||