About ESSR

History

The Society right from the beginning was founded in a spirit of internationalism, of conjoining researchers and scientists from different European countries and overseas, from clinical and experimental research and from various disciplines. The ESSR, formerly the ESES -European Society for Experimental Surgery -was founded the 17th February 1966 near Nancy, France. In the past it was felt that the term 'experimental surgery' was more and more inadequate to describe the complexity of research in surgery. At the General Assembly in Salzburg, May 16th 1974, it was decided to change the name of The Society to 'European Society for Surgical Research' - ESSR. The Society has now 697 members from 43 different countries all over the world.

Aim

At that time this basic concept -namely to bring together surgeons and engineers, immunologists and biologists and so forth -was outrageously new and effective. Today the concept still is valid, but the large number of specialist meetings, concentrating just on one or two
topics, seem to threaten the acceptance of a Society that covers all aspects of surgical research. However, it has to be emphasized that The Society has several outstanding features, that are not shared by any other research society: Besides the multidisciplinary, multinational and -sometimes - multilingual aspects, probably one of the most distinctive features is The Society's stress on youth and the promotion of young researchers. There are age limits not only for the president and the General Committee (45 years) but also for the most prestigeous award of the Society, the Walter- Brendel-Award (45 years). There are a varying number of Young Researcher Awards per year (age limit 30 to 35 years) and finally the Student Award, especially for undergraduate researchers presenting their work at the annual meeting.

More information: http://www.essr.info

Name	Present and past functions	Position elected	Position ends	Remarks	Possible time to serve (max 6 yrs) (Bylaws Article 10, g)
Mustafa Cikirikcioglu	President Past Secretary General Past Member at Large Past 1st & 2nd Vice President	2013	2015	Congress President 2010	2008- 2015
Frank Dor	Secretary General Past Member at Large 2	2013	2016		2011-2017
Rene Tolba	Treasurer Past 1st & 2nd vice president	2011	2014	Congress President 2011	2009-2015
Attila Szijarto	1st Vice President Past  2nd vice president	2013	2014	Congress President 2014	2012-2018
Thomas Theologou	2nd Vice President	2013	2014	Congress President 2015	2013-2019
Thomas Hubert	Member at Large 1	2012	2015	Congress Organizer 2012	2012-2018
Osman Yuksel	Member at Large 2 Past 1st & 2nd vice president	2013	2016	Congress President 2013	2012-2018
Mehmet Fatih Can	Member at Large 3	2013	2016	Congress Organizer 2013	2013-2019