Olaf Penack
EBMT CIC 807
Berlin, Germany"In my role as clinical cellular therapy program director, I observe that the work of EBMT positively influences our field in many aspects. However, despite all our efforts and progress in the field, significant challenges remain. I envision the following central aims of TCWP during the upcoming years: to improve the scientific and educational output and quality by expanding the collaboration with the other EBMT working parties; to strengthen partnerships with international societies; to intensify the work with patient organizations and to implement patient-reported outcomes; to promote studies on complications after SCT and cellular therapies within EBMT."
My Manifesto
The EBMT working parties offer an ideal opportunity to foster and conduct research as well as to spread knowledge. The Transplant Complications Working Party (TCWP) carries out research and provides education on complications in the fields of hematopoietic cell transplantation (SCT) and cellular therapies.
My motivation to work for EBMT and to candidate as TCWP chairperson derives directly from my daily experience as a physician. In my role as clinical cellular therapy program director, I observe that the work of EBMT positively influences our field in many aspects. The experience during my current work as GVHD subcommittee chairperson in TCWP further consolidated my strong favorable impression on the importance of the EBMT work.
Despite all our efforts and progress in the field, significant clinical problems persist that we need to address. The long-term survival rates of patients after SCT or cellular therapies remain unacceptably low. Main reasons are high relapse rates and treatment-related mortality. A key difficulty is that we do not use the full therapeutic potential of allogeneic SCT because our standard prophylactic- and therapeutic approaches mainly use immunosuppressive drugs leading to unwanted inhibition of the anti-malignant immune effects. To improve this dismal outcome, we need to optimize the current management and we need to develop novel therapeutic strategies.
I am convinced that the TCWP can provide important contributions in the future and I envision the following central aims of TCWP during the upcoming years:
- to improve the scientific and educational output and quality by expanding the collaboration with the other EBMT working parties
- to strengthen partnerships with international societies as well as with potential investors in the field
- to intensify the work with patient organizations and to implement the documentation of patient-reported outcomes within EBMT
- to promote retrospective and prospective studies on complications after SCT and cellular therapies under the EBMT shelter
Note: The online voting period will run from Tuesday, 18 March 2025, to Monday, 31 March 2025. Principal Investigators (PI's) from active EBMT member centres will be able to cast their vote online for their preferred candidate within the open positions. The elections results will be announced live at the General Assembly Meeting on Tuesday, 1 April (07:45 am CET), during the 51st Annual Meeting of the EBMT. Instructions on how to vote will be sent out to PI's closer to the voting start date.