Recent News from the President

Executive Board

The outgoing and incoming Executive Boards met with the Chairs of the Divisions in the IFCC Office in Milan in November. The agenda was huge but the atmosphere was positive and constructive. There was real evidence of achievement during 2011 and this will be recorded in the annual report, which will be published in early 2012. Several exciting new topics were discussed and more details will be sent to Members over the next few weeks. These include:

• Increasing activity in point of care testing
• Increasing activity in distance learning
• Increasing activity in demonstrating the clinical value of laboratory medicine
• Moves towards electronic voting
• The 60^th anniversary of IFCC in 2012
• The IFCC General Conference in 2012
• Travel scholarships
• Professional exchange programmes

Changing EB members
The change in personnel from January 2012 will be:

I should like to record my personal thanks to all completing their periods of office and welcome the new team.

IFCC WorldLab Berlin 2011

Final statistics from the Berlin congress reveal that it was even more successful than anticipated in terms of attendance, scientific involvement, exhibition involvement and financial outcome. It was also a great experience in a wonderful city. Congratulations to all involved.

Other Congresses

It has been my pleasure to attend two major congresses in October and November 2011:

• 50^th Anniversary of the Australasian Association of Clinical Biochemists, which was held in Sydney, Australia.
• XX Congress of the Confederación Latinoamericana de Bioquímica Clínica, (COLABIOCLI) which was held in Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic. During this meeting I had the opportunity to meet with representatives of the outgoing COLABIOCLI Executive Committee to discuss communication and joint projects (see photograph). During the General Assembly Argentina was elected as the country to provide the next President of COLABIOCLI

Both congresses showed that clinical chemistry and laboratory medicine is vibrant, and that it is making a real difference to healthcare in the differing geographical locations. Both congresses were also accompanied by weather that was considerably better than back home in Scotland - a real bonus!

 The people present at a meeting between COLABIOCLI Officers and the IFCC President. From left to right: