On June 2008 at the EuroPACS annual meeting in Barcelona, Professor Osman Ratib from the University of Geneva was elected as the new president of EuroPACS society. The following letter summarizes the main topics that were presented to the general assembly of EuroPACS by Dr. Ratib as his vision of expanding the influence of EuroPACS and broadening its scope of action.

Founded in 1982 EuroPACS has established itself as a scientific reference circle of reputable experts in the field of imaging informatics and PACS. It has gained its credentials
at the time when PACS development and implementation was still at the frontier of technical innovations in medicine. During the early years of EuroPACS commercial
systems and vendor solutions did not exist and EuroPACS annual meetings were a unique opportunity to meet the pioneers in the field and learn from their technical innovations and developments.
With the rapid evolution of PACS, commercial solutions have emerged on the market and the technical aspects of implementation and development of such systems became less relevant to the scientific community in the field. Recent PACS research focused more on image analysis, CAD, informatics, economic, workflow etc. These new areas of interest in the EuroPACS community started to overlap with the work of other scientific communities such as those represented in CARS and ESR. A careful management of the equilibrium between the topics covered by different scientific societies in annual conferences of CARS have helped maintain the focus of EuroPACS on its original scope. However the field of research in this specific niche has progressively shifted toward new specific domains that may have contributed to a decrease in the number of participants and research projects presented and discussed at these meetings.
While there is no doubt that EuroPACS should continue to pursue its promotion of research activities in new domains such as image management in surgery, image guided interventions, workflow modeling and imaging informatics, it should also expand in other avenues. Time has come to widen the scope of EuroPACS activities while maintaining its original mission. A broader range of actions and activities as well as a more active series of promotional actions can help re-establish its position in the competitive field of imaging informatics.

Shaping a new image of EuroPACS
The major asset of EuroPACS is its unique group of members. It includes the elite with members that were pioneers in the field and are the most knowledgeable about PACS and
imaging informatics si ce the early days. With their broad expertise and know-how most members of the society are high ranking academics with international reputation and extensive network of professional and scientific connections. Besides, they are all highly praised educators and eloquent teachers. With such asset, EuroPACS society can reshape its image and easily acquire an international brand of a leading body of experts inthe field of imaging informatics and PACS. It could become again the reference body that conveys complex state-of-the-art concepts in forms that are more widely accessible to the clinical and scientific community. It can provide a unique channel between standardization and regulatory bodies and the medical community, conveying technical specifications and complex regulations and recommendations in forms that are more accessible to people who are not experts in the field. And, most importantly, EuroPACS could become the initiator of training program and education courses, taking advantage of the skills of its members and their teaching ability to provide high level education programs.

New initiatives of EuroPACS
In recent discussions among members of EuroPACS several new ideas have emerged regarding actions that could reshape EuroPACS image and its brand. The long lasting experience of its founding members together with innovative ideas from new members lead to new concepts and ideas for new initiatives in areas that are not yet covered by other scientific communities and societies. Among these new initiatives one should mention the following:
• Creating a new program called “EuroPACS Academy” that consist of education courses on PACS, Imaging Informatics and technology. These courses will be given in different cities of Europe at a regular interval independently from the annual EuroPACS meeting that will be held together with CARS when in Europe. This course will allow to extend the reach of the society to new members and participants and also establish its role as a reference education body in the field. The faculty will be leading experts recruited among EuroPACS members. The topics covered by these courses will focus on practical issues and implementation guidelines for development and deployment of medical imaging infrastructure and systems. It will also provide the scientific and medical community with up-to-date information on standards and innovative concepts in imaging informatics. In consistence with EuroPACS tradition these courses will focus on practical clinical
implementations and real world experiences intended for physicians and IT specialists.
• Extending the outreach to industrial and commercial partners by opening EuroPACS to corporate membership. According to its initial policy, EuroPACS allows industry and corporations to participate with delegate members that can actively contribute to EuroPACS activities and initiatives. In addition to the sponsorship that corporate members provide, they also facilitate cross fertilization between academic and industrial communities. In a field where commercial systems are constantly being challenged by new concepts and shifts of paradigm in medical practice, such collaboration between academia and industry could certainly be mutually beneficial.
• Increasing EuroPACS visibility on Internet by re-designing and expanding its web site with the goal to establish a reference source of exclusive and edited information regarding recent initiatives in Europe as well as standardization and recommendations from european and international organizations. This information is readily accessible to EuroPACS members who are also members of working groups and official bodies such as ICT, ESR, IHE etc. They have access to all recent documents regarding standards, recommendations, guidelines and national and international regulations. Unfortunately these documents are always very technical and hard to understand for most people. Our role would be to compile and summarize this information and make it available to our members in a more accessible form. This would be a benefit to EuroPACS members and to the community at large. If we do it right EuroPACS web site could become a reference site for such information and documentation which will also increase our visibility and attract new members.
• Promoting Open-Source initiatives in software development in the field of medical imaging, PACS and medical informatics. The emerging trend in development and distribution of Open Source software is growing rapidly in different domains of medical informatics. With its annual meeting and its new EuroPACS academy courses, EuroPACS could become a precious promotional tool for researchers and developers who want to share their work through Open Source software. The diversity and expertise of EuroPACS members could also serve as a forum for testing and validation of Open Source software in real clinical settings. EuroPACS should rapidly become a platform for promotion and validation of Open Source software. With its link with industry, it could
also help bridging between academic software developers and industrial partners that want to integrate Open Source software in commercial systems.
In conclusion EuroPACS will be expanding its scope of activities in response to changes in technical developments and clinical requirements over the recent years with a shift from pioneer work in PACS to more widespread applications of imaging informatics. Moving away from technical developments that are nowadays provided by commercial systems it will focus more on integration and implementation issues with emphasis on clinical workflow and practical applications. By reinforcing its ties with industry EuroPACS can become a reference forum for exchange of information between industry and academics.
We will also pursue our policy of collaboration with other scientific and medical societies. Our long lasting collaboration with CARS hosting the EuroPACS annual meetings has clearly demonstrated the advantages of having simultaneous meetings of different scientific domains such as image processing, robotics, computer assisted surgery, computer assisted diagnosis etc. These multidisciplinary meetings helped us maintain a wide scope of activities while avoiding unnecessary overlap with other domains. We will pursue the same policy with other scientific societies such as ESR in an effort to extend our reach to other communities.
EuroPACS will continue to pursue its original mission under its new mission statement of“linking research to clinical practice”.

Osman Ratib

SHORT BIOGRAPHY:
Professor Osman Ratib is a board certified Cardiologist and Radiologist who obtained his medical degrees at
the University of Geneva and a Ph.D. in Medical Imaging from University of California Los Angeles in 1989.
He gained an international reputation in the development of computer aided diagnosis in cardiac imaging
and in the development of Image Management and Communication Systems and Picture Archiving and
Communication Systems (PACS). He became one of the active figures in medical imaging research in
Europe and has participated in several European coordinated projects. After serving a first term of one year
as president of EuroPACS in 1997, he was appointed as Professor and Vice Chairman of the Department of
Radiology at UCLA from 1998 to 2005 when he returned to Switzerland to be appointed as Professor and
Chairman of the Department of Medical Imaging and Information Sciences and Head of the Division of
Nuclear Medicine at the University Hospital of Geneva.