EFP leaves Bern general assembly bigger and stronger than ever

The EFP held its executive committee meeting and general assembly in Bern, Switzerland, on March 29 and 30, welcoming seven new member societies (six from beyond Europe) and a new team of officers.

The assembly welcomed the periodontal society of Georgia as an associate member along with six international associate members from beyond Europe (the societies of Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Lebanon, Mexico, and Taiwan.)

There are now 37 members of the EFP: 26 full members, five associate members, and six international associate members.

In terms of officers, Nicola West (UK) has taken over from Iain Chapple as secretary general, while Monique Danser (Netherlands) assumed the role of treasurer from Jörg Meyle (Germany). Anton Sculean (Switzerland) handed over the one-year presidency to Filippo Graziani (Italy).

The assembly elected Andreas Stavropoulos (Sweden) as elected member, and he will become president in 2022, following Filippo Graziani (2019-20), Xavier Struillou (2020-21), and Lior Shapira (2021-22). In his role as elected member, he will act as the co-ordinator of Gum Health Day 2020.

The assembly also witnessed a preview of the toolkit on the new classification of periodontal and peri-implant diseases and conditions that the EFP has created to assist clinicians in their daily practice. This is now being provided to the national societies to be translated into various languages for wider distribution.

There were also updates on plans for EuroPerio10 (Copenhagen, June 2021) and Perio Master Clinic 2020 (Dublin, March 2020), as well as reports from the national societies on their plans for Gum Health Day 2019 on May 12;

In addition, the EFP presented its Distinguished Scientist Award to Giovan Paolo Pini Prato (Italy) and its Distinguished Service award to Michel Brecx (Belgium).

The EFP Postgraduate Research Prizes were awarded to teams from the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical Center, Jerusalem (Israel) and the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium).

"We leave Bern bigger and stronger than ever, thanks to the work achieved in recent years by Iain Chapple and my predecessors as president including Anton Sculean, Gernot Wimmer, and Juan Blanco," said new EFP president Filippo Graziani. "We have a new team which brings new ideas and new projects. So we can look forward with confidence to the next stage of the EFP's evolution."