October 2018

Letter from the Secretary General, Professor Eleftherios Tsiridis

Dear Members,

The next EHS Travelling Fellowship is open for applications and will support two young hip surgeons to visit top orthopaedic centres in Europe for three weeks in Spring 2019. The deadline for applications is 31st October, so please tell young surgeons in your department to apply now.

Thank you to all members who came to our very successful 13th Congress in The Hague, and to the Full Members who took part in our democratic vote at the General Assembly for a new President 2020-22: welcome to the winner, Prof Klaus Siebenrock of Berne in Switzerland, who we are confident will do an excellent job. Also welcome to Assoc Prof Martin Thaler of Innsbruck, Austria, who takes over with immediate effect as new Treasurer of EHS for a four year term. Both introduce themselves below. Two new Nat Reps were also officially introduced: Dr Stig Jakobsen for Denmark, who has already contributed to this Newsletter, and Assoc Prof Boris Steno for Slovakia.

Many hip surgeons applied for membership at the EHS booth during the congress, where Samantha Stokes our Membership Secretary also received outstanding membership payments. I would ask all members who still have not paid, to please contact Samantha at your earliest convenience. Thank you.

“The Adult Hip – Master Case Series and Techniques“, with contributions from many EHS members, was on sale at the Springer booth at the congress and is of course available online. I am very pleased with it and wish to thank all the distinguished experts who sent their interesting hip cases for publication, providing readers with a comparative and comprehensive overview of surgical techniques today.

Congress season is in full swing and our Hip Meetings Calendar is a useful tool. EHS speakers will head back to The Netherlands for the Najaarscongres of the Dutch Orthopaedic Society in Rotterdam on 10th October. Also present will be the two EHS Visiting Fellows 2018, Dr Loppini and Dr Santos Leite, who will travel around top Dutch operating rooms for two weeks. Look out for their report next month.

I will be speaking at DKOU in Berlin in a few weeks, organised by EHS President 2014-16, Prof Siebert. Then it’s SOFCOT in Paris, the Estonian Orthopaedic Congress, several UK courses, the Portuguese Society of Orthopaedics & Traumatology’s hip revision arthroplasty course followed by the MAST 5 Course in Arthroplasty Surgery (7-9th December 2018 in Thessaloniki, Hellas). This latter is an EHS-co-organised and EFORT-approved event, where as Congress President, alongside the EHS President, Dr Epinette and President of the Congress SciCom, Dr Sayegh, we will welcome many keen hip surgeons from around the world. Delegates can experience the virtual reality training platform, and young specialists applying to the Tsiridis-Frimley Park Fellowship can have a preliminary interview with the faculty.

Best wishes,

EHS Secretary General, Professor Eleftherios Tsiridis

Prof Klaus-Arno Siebenrock, Switzerland

EHS President 2020-2022

I’m honoured to be the future president of the EHS 2020. I do offer full commitment to further promote this important society. Since 2005 I am assigned full professor and chairman of the Orthopaedic and Traumatologic Department at the University of Bern, Switzerland. The Department represents one of the largest combined Orthopaedic and level 1 Trauma centres in Switzerland. The founder of this Department and one of my antecessors was Professor Maurice E Müller, who was among the first genius pioneers worldwide to promote total hip arthroplasty (THA).

My surgical practice is exclusively focused on hip surgery covering all the fields from THA, an increasing number of complex THA revisions, hip traumatology and treatment of the painful young hip. Hip joint preservation surgery is a dominant domain where my Department is regarded to be among the international leaders. We developed the first experimental model (sheep hip model) to imitate early cartilage degeneration of the hip during femoro-acetabular impingement. Early osteoarthritis, test imaging modalities and treatment efficacies can be
monitored with direct correlation to histopathology. The results of latest research and innovative surgical treatment modalities are presented and published biannually in context with the Bernese Hip Symposium.

My CV spans more than 200 peer-reviewed publications. Research grants are provided by the Swiss National Foundation or international grants. The most prestigious awards are a Gold Paper Award from EFORT and the Pauwels Medal from the German Orthopaedic Society (DGOU) in 2016.

I am an assigned active member in many committees (e.g. Swiss Orthopaedics & Hip Society, International Hip Society, EHS). My goals as a president of the EHS are twofold. First, we should bundle European scientific knowledge in order to further strengthen the self-confidence of our society on the international field. Second we need to build up new young hip surgeons. This should be done by fellowships at renown European hip centres and structured educational courses for systematic improvement of knowledge throughout EHS member countries.

Associate Prof Martin Thaler, Austria

EHS Treasurer 2018-2022

Dear EHS members and friends,
My Name is Martin Thaler and I am very honoured that I was voted to be the next Treasurer of the EHS one week ago in Den Haag.

I am a Associate Professor working at the Medical University of Innsbruck at the Department of Orthopedics. I am an orthopedic and trauma surgeon, specialized on hip pathologies and oncology. I frequently train residents and colleagues from all over the world in hip courses held in Innsbruck. I am in charge for student education in orthopedics at the University.

I have a background in financing, having received a Master’s degree in managing from the University of Krems. I am also doing right now a Master’s degree in Business Administration at the Middlesex University.

My areas of expertise include minimally invasive total hip replacements, complex revision surgery, femuroacetabular impingement surgery, oncologic surgery as well as fracture treatment of the hip.

In Innsbruck I am the head of the certified arthroplasty centre and the hip team. My current research focuses on revision surgeries of the hip, robotics, navigation and infection after surgery and on how to improve the lifespan of joint replacements. I build up an expertise in treating infections and other serious complications after hip joint replacement, and I am very proud that patients come from around the country to ask for my expertise.

I want to thank again all EHS members to give me the trust to be a member of the ExCom and responsible for the finances of the EHS.