Letter from the Editor

Dear Reader,

The 35th Annual EAU Congress was held between 17 and 26 July and consisted of the 3-day EAU20 Virtual Congress and 7-day Theme week. This year’s Annual EAU Congress was supposed to be held in Amsterdam. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the congress went virtual for the first time.

The congress provided state-of-the-art urological science and education and comprised hot topics, cutting edge science, and important updates in a mix of oncology and non-oncology sessions.

New urosepsis data of the prospective observational SERPENS study indicated the use of early selective antibiotic therapy.

The phase 3 KEYNOTE-426 trial demonstrated a significant survival advantage for patients with metastatic renal-cell carcinoma receiving pembrolizumab and axitinib with no difference in quality of life compared with sunitinib.

A debate was held on upfront cytoreductive nephrectomy in renal cancer surgery, confirming its role in patients that do not deserve immediate medical treatment.

The large IRON study demonstrated that robot-assisted partial nephrectomy is associated with lower morbidity and similar oncologic and long-term renal function outcomes compared with open partial nephrectomy.

A post-hoc analysis of the phase 3 NIMBUS trial demonstrated that reducing the frequency of BCG instillations during induction and maintenance is inferior to the standard BCG schedule regarding time to first recurrence of non-muscle invasive bladder cancer. The ProPSMA study showed that PSMA PET-CT staging is 27% more accurate than conventional imaging.

This report will outline the highlights discussed at the conference. Besides the subjects indicated above, this includes interesting findings in oncological and functional urology, stones, imaging, LUTS, and much more. We hope that you will enjoy reading this Conference Report!

Kind regards,

Prof. Hendrik Van Poppel

 

Biography:

Hendrik Van Poppel, MD, PhD, graduated in General Surgery and in Urology and received his postgraduate training in London, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Mainz, and Rotterdam. He obtained a PhD in Medical Sciences in 1988. He became a Fellow of the European Board of Urology in 1992, full Professor of Urology in 1993, and chair of the department of urology in Leuven in 2002.

He was Director of the European School of Urology for 8 years before becoming EAU Adjunct Secretary General, responsible for Education, in 2012. During his mandate he started the set-up of new EAU Offices for Patient affairs and for European political business in Brussels.

Prof. Van Poppel attended more than EAU 2016 München 1000 scientific meetings and gave 900 lectures at national and international podia. He has published 221 papers as first author on uro-oncology and has co-authored more than 480 and (co-)edited several books on kidney and prostate cancer. He is reviewer and editorial Board Member for more than 30 urological and uro-oncological journals.

He received the Distinguished Career Award of the Société Internationale d’Urologie (SIU) in Buenos Aires in 2016 and the Frans Debruyne Life time achievement award of the EAU in 2020.

Conflict of Interest Statement: Nothing to disclose



©2016 Edwin van Wijk



Posted on 20 August, 20205 August, 2021