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Report from the 7th Annual Conference of the IFESS, Ljubljana 2002 |
The International Functional Electrical Stimulation Society (IFESS) 2002 conference took place in Ljubljana from June 25th to June 29th and so continues the successful series of events from Cleveland 1996, Vancouver 1997, Lucerne 1998, Sendai 1999, Aalborg 2000, and Cleveland 2001. The venue was the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the University of Ljubljana, the place where the late professor L. Vodovnik began his pioneering research in FES in the 1960s.
The IFESS 2002 conference focused on 'the state of the art', the 'assessment of new achievements', and the discussion of 'future goals' in various applications of FES. Predominantly however, for the restoration of motor function and sensory function of individuals with motor disabilities such as hemiplegia, spinal cord injury (SCI), cerebral palsy (CP), multiple sclerosis (MS) and head trauma. A strong emphasis was placed on multidisciplinary approaches, clinical applications, and the functional benefits of assistive devices in terms of quality of life and social participation of the disabled. The conference brought together the leading specialists in the field of FES from both engineering and medical backgrounds which helped promote new and emerging concepts for FES applications, as well as providing a vehicle for the dissemination of the latest results. A visit to the Institute for Rehabilitation was an interesting accompaniment to regular scientific sessions as it provided an overview of practical everyday applications of the FES within the clinical environment.
With the help of renowned members of the international scientific committee we were able to put together an outstanding scientific program with over 140 papers from 484 authors that were presented in either oral or poster sessions. Papers were categorized into 8 topics: lower extremities, upper extremities, gait & posture, muscles & nerves, therapeutic stimulation, control, stimulation technology and bladder & bowel. The most numerous contributions were in sessions of muscles & nerves, therapeutic stimulation and stimulation technology.
Three invited speakers presented the their own view of special topics of interest. Prof. J.T. Mortimer gave a brief overview of the latest achievements and presented a very encouraging and fascinating list of potential new applications of the FES in the long term. Prof. M.R. Dimitrijevic, explained how FES can be used in the restoration of the locomotion from the neurophysiological point of view. Finally, prof. T Sinkjaer, the president of the IFESS society, gave the closing lecture, with an interesting summary of the role of the IFESS society with particular reference to future FES developments
Winners of the Best Student Paper Award "Lojze Vodovnik": L. Malone, Y. Aoyagi, V. Vince (from left to right) IFESS 2002, Ljubljana, Slovenia |
All regular and student papers are of course compiled in electronic and hard-copy format. These compilations are edited by prof. R Jaeger, prof. P Veltink and assist. prof. T Karcnik and are still available from the conference organisers.
The conference attracted over 240 attendees. One of the reasons for such interest was due to the financial support from the European Commission (grant No. QLG5-CT-2002-30206) and the support of the Republic of Slovenia Ministry of Education, Science and Sport. The attendees enjoyed the renowned Slovene hospitality and a truly great social program that offered ample opportunity for informal information exchange and discussion.
The conference web page with a complete scientific program is still available at:
http://robo.fe.uni-lj.si/ifess2002
Tomaz Karcnik
Assist.prof.
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