Minutes of the Council Meeting held on 9th December 2008 at The Royal Society of Medicine, London
Present:
Gabriela Möslein, Chairperson
Terri Berk
Steffen Bulow
James Church
Annika Lindblom
Patrick Lynch
Finlay Macrae
Kay Neale
Robin Phillips
Miguel Rodriguez Bigas
Allan Spigelman
Ian Tomlinson
Hans Vasen
1. Apologies for Absence
Takeo Iwama and Susan Peterson
2. Minutes of the last meeting
Minutes of the last meeting, which had been distributed prior to the meeting, were agreed to be an accurate record.
3. Business arising from the Minutes
Professor Macrae noted that the flyer to encourage membership, which had been suggested at the last meeting, had not been produced.
4. Membership Update
Membership stood at 110 in 2008, 34 members have renewed their subscriptions for 2009 to date. Despite the fact that invoices were followed by a reminder if a member did not pay there were still a number of people who let their membership lapse. Some of these people were seen to remain active in the Society and even expressed an interest in joining Council or taking the Chair.
It was suggested that the list of fully paid up members be put onto the website, perhaps in the form of a spread sheet, so that each year a note "paid" could be added to each name as they renewed their subscription for that year. There was debate as to whether this was acceptable or not and no decision reached but it was agreed that the aim should be to encourage/remind people to pay not to be shamed. Members would, of course, need to give permission for their name to be entered onto such a list.
Council accepted that regular review of members status with a view to sending more and more reminders was time consuming. Ms Berk offered to help chase those who did not pay up.
5. Website update
The new version of the website was approved by everyone. It was agreed that the logo should remain as approved by copyright.
There was discussion as to whether collaborative research projects or all studies should be listed. It was agreed that local studies should be included so that people could be aware of what was being done in order to avoid duplication. It was decided that Council should review a request for a study to go onto the site and that at a minimum local ethics approval must have been obtained.
A notice of the 2011 meeting in Texas will be added to the site as soon as the dates have been agreed.
There was a suggestion that a three monthly newsletter be sent by email and the website address be embedded in the letter to encourage visits.
6. Human Variome Project and InSiGHT
Professor Macrae reported that the Human Variome Project (HVP) committee are looking to InSiGHT to manage the collection of DNA variants in the bowel cancer genes, and the associated annotation of the variants. Mike Woods is the Chair of the InSiGHT MMR Variant Curation Committee responsible for managing curation of the variants entering and in the database and also participating in the interpretation processes in the committee chaired by Maurizio Genuardi. An InSiGHT committee developing synoptic reporting of phenotype will meet this afternoon (Dec 9th) at the RSM. The Interpretation Committee (Chair, Maurizio Genuardi) will be meeting with IARC (Sean Tavtigian) in Lyon on Feb 19 and 20th to develop an algorithm to assist in interpretation of variants in the MMR genes.
InSiGHT members attended the meeting in Costa Brava in May where good collaborative groups were formed. A report of the meeting was published in Science in November. People were confident that ethics approval could be obtained for the HVP database.
Funding continues to be an issue as the project will be a service not research but there is a lot of interest from Australian Federal Government Ministers. Commercial organisations will be approached with the idea of "adopt a gene", it is thought that companies such as Wrangler and Levis would be interested; Deloitte's have been approached with a A$200,00 costing for adopting the MMR genes; (Subsequent to the meeting, it has been learnt that the approach has been declined).
Council acknowledged the work done by Professor Macrae on behalf of InSiGHT in this area.
7. InSiGHT Newsletter
Dr Church volunteered to be the Editor of a Newsletter, which will be web-based. He will choose a committee who will suggest articles from the literature and highlight the main points and clinical application. The Newsletter will be produced quarterly and the first will be sent out as the programme for the meeting in Dusseldorf is being finalised.
8. Representation from South America
There is reported to be a lot of interest in InSiGHT from South America where a lot of work is being done with few resources. Council discussed the possibility of getting people from each continent onto the Council. It was noted that very few names are put forward when the call for nominees is sent out to every member a few months before each Biennial Meeting. Even if someone is nominated to stand for election they still have to be voted in by the Membership. It is, therefore, important to make sure that a person is both nominated and made known to the Members.
In choosing someone to nominate it was noted that it is important to inform the person that it is an expensive business. Council members are expected to attend the Meetings in London twice a year and have to pay their own fare and accommodation.
9. Pfizer Observational Study
The Observational Study by Pfizer has been closed having been told by the FDA that they were not required to finish it. It was thought that approximately 50 patients had been enrolled.
It was noted that patients are now being enrolled into the Paediatric Study.
10. Large Scale Genetic Studies
Several groups around the world are organising studies to identify common genes that increase the risk of bowel cancer. A meeting is planned in Leiden on 20th January 2009 to which the European groups have been invited. The aim is to pool the global data but it is not clear how to organise for this to happen. It was confirmed that steps had been made to link up with the CFR and that time for discussion has been set aside at the meeting in Dusseldorf . It was agreed that Professors Macrae and Tomlinson would suggest four or five topics and the goals to work toward.
Action: Professors Macrae and Tomlinson
11. Combined InSiGHT/HVP meeting in 2013
This item to be discussed at the afternoon meeting.
12. Update of Meeting in 2009
People wishing to attend the meeting in Dusseldorf will be able to register online, by fax or by post. The facility for submitting an abstract is only available online and is already available.
Delegates will be able to fly in to Dusseldorf airport which is very convenient for getting to the Intercontinental Hotel, the Conference Venue, in the middle of town. There are cheaper hotels nearby. The Conference Centre will have an exhibition of industry in the foyer and a large area for the poster session. It was agreed that the programme format should be decided when the abstracts are available.
The cost of attending the meeting will be 490 Euros for InSiGHT members, 565 for non-members, 280 for young scientists and nurses and 120 for partners. These prices include the Welcome Reception and evening Boat Ride but an extra 50 Euros will be charged for those wishing to attend the Conference Dinner. A tour and dinner may be arranged for the Saturday afternoon and evening if there is sufficient interest from delegates.
The cost of staying at the Intercontinental Hotel will be 199 Euros for a superior single, 224 for a superior double, 229 for a deluxe single and 250 for a deluxe double. Cheaper accommodation is available in hotels nearby.
Dr Lynch agreed to find out the position with regard to CMEs.
Professor Möslein will ask Professor Phillips about the possibility of getting the abstracts published in Colorectal Disease.
Action CME's: Dr Lynch
Action publication of abstracts: Professor Möslein
13. Deputy Chairman for 2009
It was thought that there was no Constitutional requirement for the Chairmanship to rotate from Europe to the Americas to Australasia, although this had been agreed by Council to be preferable. Should Indian, South American or Chinese members be voted to Council and then take the Chair, meetings in these places would be very welcome, indeed the last meeting had been held in Japan. It was thought important to remember that great financial responsibility is held by the person hosting the meeting because the Society has no funds to support a meeting that runs up a deficit; this has been known to happen. It was confirmed that where income exceeds expenditure the excess is split 60% to the Chairman's Institution and 40% to InSiGHT.
Professor Macrae nominated Professor Allan Spigelman as to take over as Deputy Chairman in 2009. This proposal was seconded by Ms Terri Berk and carried unanimously. Professor Spigelman will take over the Chair in 2011 and host the Biennial Meeting in 2013.
14. Biennial Meeting in 2011
The meeting in 2011 will be co-hosted by Dr Patrick Lynch and Dr Miguel Rodriguez Bigas. They reported that the conference planner will be MD Anderson Conference Support Services. The venue will be San Antonio, which is a very pretty area.
The choices of dates for the meeting are: the beginning of April, the third week of April or 20th October 2011.
15. Any other business
Council wished to record sadness at the news of the death of Professor Jeremy Jass and to acknowledge the contribution made by him over the last two decades.
16. Date of next meeting
The next meeting will be held on Thursday 26th and Friday 27th February 2009.