Welcome to the International Liver Cancer Association

Dear ILCA Members and Supporters,
Dear Colleagues,

Our Third Annual Conference earlier this month will be remembered in many ways, which are definitely worth sharing with our entire community.

The first significant highlight is the success of the conference: indeed, over 650 liver cancer specialists from 45 countries and all related disciplined convened with us in Milan, Italy, for 3 days of intensive debates around HCC. The Conference's success demonstrated how the International Liver Cancer Association has, in 3 years time, grown into a mature organisation providing a highest quality multidisciplinary platform on HCC. This event was instrumental to confirm the status of the International Liver Cancer Association as an international reference for promoting the advancement of liver cancer research and care.

Complete programme information is available here, and please note that most of the scientific sessions were recorded and will soon be available to the ILCA community through this web platform.

We thank all of you who were there with us in Milan, as well as our partners from the pharmaceutical industry who contributed to making the conference a success on all levels.

ILCA 2009 will also be remembered by the whole ILCA community because it marked the first important turnover in the ILCA leadership: Five members of the Governing Board stepped down, including the Founding President Jordi Bruix. During this first period of ILCA life and thanks to the collaborative effort of all the Governing Board members it has been feasible to bring the International Liver Cancer Association to a remarkable level of maturity from 2007 to 2009.

During the President’s Farewell Speech that he gave during the conference, Jordi Bruix highlighted again the key objective that a group of liver cancer researchers had in mind when bringing ILCA to life: advancing liver cancer science and care through priming liver cancer across disciplines. Mission duly accomplished so far!

His successor, Gregory Gores (USA), was introduced and recognized at the organization’s General Assembly, who welcomed him as ILCA President for the 2 coming years. Internationally recognized Professor in Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Gregory Gores has also contributed to the development of several key organizations for advancing knowledge of liver diseases. As the retiring President indicated, ILCA will without a doubt strongly benefit from Greg’s scientific proficiency and enthusiasm.
 
The 4 other new ILCA Governing Board members were also given a warm welcome from the General Assembly: Pierre Bedossa (France), Curtis Harris (USA), Kim Olthoff (USA), Masatoshi Kudo (Japan).

All these developments mark the end of a first phase for ILCA - your organisation, which, since its First Annual Conference in Barcelona, Spain, launched an insightful new generation of international meetings pioneering a transversal approach to liver cancer research.
All the scientific programme outlines of ILCA conferences are available in the Annual Conferences section of this web site, for your convenience.
Make sure to visit www.ilca2010.org regularly for updates on ILCA 2010 in Montreal, QC, Canada.

Warm regards,

The ILCA Governing Board

Gregory Gores, USA (President)
Josep M. Llovet, Spain/USA (Executive Secretary)
Peter Galle, Germany (Treasurer)

Pierre Bedossa, France
Curt Harris, USA
Masatoshi Kudo, Japan
Riccardo Lencioni, Italy
Vincenzzo Mazzaferro, Italy
Kim Olthoff, USA
Snorri Thorgeirson, USA
Sheng-Long Ye, China