Dear colleagues
Warm welcome to the World Congress of Dermatology 2023 in Singapore! To make a difference, the scientific programming committee (SPC) developed an entirely new format for this event. Despite the global threats, the world is moving closer together and the interdependencies are increasing. In this challenging context, the World Congress of Dermatology 2023 provides the highest quality of global dermatology continuing education as specialists from all over the world, including areas previously underrepresented, will enrich us from different angles.
Major inclusive effort has been taken to identify and invite leading dermatologists from Africa, Asia, Middle-East and South-America to enrich the scientific program. To make the Congress a true World Congress, the SPC and local organizer have:
- invited distinguished speakers on topics of global responsibility
- provided an unprecedented number of scholarships to support attendees especially from low and lower-middle-income countries
- completely restructured the congress format. moving towards a structured format promoting exchange on topics most relevant to dermatology in 2023 and beyond.
How does the new format look like?
Distinguished Lectures which go beyond clinical medicine. Prominent scientists will address topics of world-wide impact such as the distribution of resources or the human impact on climate change. In subsequent Plenary Lectures, internationally-recognized experts summarize newest insights into 15 disease entities.
Instead of the classical formats, 60 full- or half-day Symposia focus on individual disease entities, from epidemiology and pathophysiology through clinical and histological diagnosis to treatment – addressing both classical and most recent approaches. This allows to get profound insights into many important skin diseases and their treatments from different parts of the world.
Furthermore, two Hot Topics sessions will address entities of immediate relevance to our specialty.
The third new format, the Expert Forum, will be truly interactive. Short statements by widely known experts introduce debated topics to be subsequently discussed between experts and delegates. To ensure lively discussions, Expert Forums have a maximum of 100 participants. The discussions will be summarized by the chair.
Because of their success during previous congresses, we will keep the Controversy Sessions, the Courses and Free Communications.
Organizing such a program with a world-wide scope is the work of many. First of all, I want to thank the chairs and speakers. They are the ones who prepared their presentations and will enrich us with their knowledge. We are especially grateful to all those from low- and middle-income countries, for whom joining this congress is also a major financial effort.
We all are grateful to the hundreds of experts and the ILDS member societies who helped to form the program, to formulate the most appropriate and most pressing questions, and to find the best speakers from all over the world. You might miss the participation of some prominent experts – we hope that these experts and also you forgive us for that, as we took a major effort to involve young stars, early in their career.
We would like to thank the strong support provided by members of the Scientific Program Committee, Professor Roy Chan, the local organizing committee, and the ILDS member societies from all over the world for helping to shape a world-wide and balanced program.
I’m especially grateful to Professor Henry Lim, co-chair of the SPC and ILDS president-elect. He provided tremendous help and guided the SPC for some months during difficult periods. Without his support realizing this program would have been impossible.
This said, we sincerely hope that you will enjoy the program and that this World Congress will deeply enrich us and make all of us better dermatologists for our patients.
Yours
Prof. Dr. Martin Röcken
Chair, Scientific Program Committee
Prof. Henry W. Lim
Vice Chair, Scientific Program Committee
