News from the Society

• A Message from the President
• A Message from Dominique Tessier following the Montréal Conference
• Body of Knowledge and Certificate of Knowledge Update
• ISTM - Nursing Task Force formally adjourned at CISTM6
• Nursing Continuing Education Units (CEU's)

A Message from the President

The sixth conference of the International Society of Travel Medicine (CISTM-6) was highly successful. I want to give special thanks to the chairperson of the Conference Organizing Committee, Dominique Tessier for all her hard work. Likewise, the Organizing Committee could not have been as successful as it was without the devotion and consummate professionalism of Ms. Susan Stokes. Many attendees commented on the quality and breadth of the plenary sessions. In this regard I want to single out for special praise the excellent work of the Co-Chairs of the Scientific Committee, Frank Bia, Christoph Hatz and Stephen Ostroff.

Judging by the general quality of the oral presentations and the posters we are clearly still a young society. The quality of the research presentations will improve as the reputation of ISTM matures. We should be able to attract reports on many excellent studies under the broad definition of travel medicine. We need to convince investigators to prefer our meeting to infectious diseases, tropical medicine and similar society meetings.

During the conference the Executive Board of the International Society of Travel Medicine and the various committee chairs and members were very active. Following the conference in Montreal the Executive Board and others from around the world conducted a strategic planning meeting that was followed by an Executive Board meeting. These meetings served to stimulate much discussion and action that we will share with you in future communications and in reports from the various committees that will be published in NewsShare.

You should know the Executive Board and Chairpersons of ISTM committees. All of these people will now be expected to attend the Executive Board meeting held at the biennial CISTM. Please contact any of them if you are interested in serving ISTM or have suggestions. Brenda Bagwell, our very able secretary to the Secretariat can help you reach any ISTM member. She can also send you details about how to join ISTM in the event you are not a member. She can be reached at bcbistm@aol.com, and her address is PO Box 871089, Stone Mountain, GA 30087.

The Executive Board members are:

President: Charles Ericsson (USA), Past-president: Michel Rey (France), President-elect: Louis Loutan (Switzerland), Counselor: Brad Connor (USA), Counselor: David Freedman (USA), Counselor: Santanu Chatterjee (India), Counselor: Karen Howell (UK)

Secretary/Treasurer: Frank Von Sonnenberg (Germany), Special Advisor to the Board: Phyllis Kozarsky (USA), Special Advisor to the Board: Robert Steffen (Switzerland), Administrative Director of the Secretariat: Susan Stokes (USA), Secretary to the Secretariat: Brenda Bagwell (USA)

Electronic Communications: David Freedman (USA), Fundraising: Robert Steffen (Switzerland), Host Countries: Santanu Chatterjee (India), Membership: Graham Fry (Ireland), Migrant Health: Louis Loutan (Switzerland), Professional Education and Training: Phyllis Kozarsky (USA), Publications: Christoph Hatz (Switzerland), Research Committee: Pat Schlagenhauf (Switzerland), Travel Industry and Public Education: Brad Connor (USA), Long Range Planning Committee: Michel Rey (France)

CISTM-7 Appointees

Chair of the CISTM-7 Organizing Committee: Frank Von Sonnenberg (Germany), Chair of the Scientific Committee: David Freedman (USA), Co-Chair of the Scientific Committee: Robert Steffen (Switzerland).

At the Board meeting each chair presented his or her committee’s progress to date and indicated what resources might be necessary to reach goals. While details are forthcoming the Executive Board identified certain goals.

The membership committee is a high priority as we try to identify how better to benefit our members and how to appeal to members of national societies of travel medicine to join ISTM. We are intent upon putting your membership dollars to work to generate identifiable membership benefits. One short-term goal is to publish updated membership and clinic directories, both of which should be available soon and will be on the web site free to ISTM members.

We are also exploring how we can improve our electronic communications such as managing hot links on our web site and making NewsShare available electronically. Members will be permitted to have a free link to their clinic’s home page as long as the page is not overtly commercial. For commercial hot links we are exploring a fee for a listing in a shopping mall linked to the ISTM site. You will see your Society became rapidly heavily oriented toward electronic communications. I urge all of you to get on-line so that you can fully benefit from the Board’s commitment to regular communication with the membership.

Fund raising is a high priority in order to support the many projects that have been identified. Heretofore, our corporate sponsors have heavily subsidized the membership and projects of the International Society of Travel Medicine. ISTM is grateful for this support. The time has come to better demonstrate to sponsors how our efforts benefit them and to diversify our funding sources.

ISTM continues to be supportive of research projects and hopes to organize a clinical trials group. Information about how to apply for a grant will be available soon. The research committee is currently considering whether to target junior and less experienced researchers. This committee is also exploring the feasibility of a network of willing mentors who can help others who have ideas for research but who do not quite know how to proceed with data collection and analysis.

An ISTM task force met in the spring to consider the advisability and feasibility of establishing a certificate of knowledge in travel medicine that could be earned by either nurse or physician practitioners of travel medicine. The task force is committed to develop a body of knowledge that is advisable to know in order to practice travel medicine. This body of knowledge will be published in Journal of Travel Medicine. The development of a test necessary to grant a certificate is a much larger undertaking and further action awaits the results of the needs assessment survey that was disseminated at CISTM-6. Please note that this certificate is not certification to practice.

ISTM is actively exploring the establishment of guidelines for practice, which will be published in Journal of Travel Medicine. Initial considerations are guidelines for the Hajj and for cruise ships. Another educational success is the indexing of JTM on Medline. Our journal will now be published every other month beginning with a January 2000 issue. We have also applied for indexing with the Institute of Scientific Information, which will allow us to track our “impact factor”.

ISTM is committed to the education of the traveling public. To this end the Board is actively exploring the formation of a foundation that could be the means to better attract funds to support public education.

A major project is GeoSentinal, a system of collection and analysis of data from clinics around the world that monitors ill travelers or migrants. This system should begin supplying important information to our members in the near future. GeoSentinal has entered into a partnership with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and as such has received funding to maintain their current efforts for five years. The Executive Board supported use of additional ISTM funds especially to target and develop more European reporting sites.

New initiatives relate to the Board’s desire to enlarge the definition of travel medicine. Many of ISTM members are practitioners who are concerned with promoting the health of travelers such as tourists and business travelers. ISTM is embarking on major efforts to embrace a broader definition of travel to include migration and the impact of travel on both developing and developed host countries.

I hope you share with me a sense of enthusiasm for the goals and directions that ISTM is taking. Please share this enthusiasm with your colleagues. You are the best ambassador that ISTM can have.

Warm regards,

Charles D. Ericsson
President, International Society of Travel Medicine

A Message from Dominique Tessier following the Montréal Conference

It is hard to believe that after so many weeks and months of intense preparation, the 6th Conference of the International Society of Travel Medicine is finally over. The week of the Conference seemed to fly by, and I feel as though I haven’t quite come back down to earth yet!

The Conference was a wonderful success in every sense of the word. There were over 2000 participants, from 64 countries, more than any previous ISTM Conference. A true international Conference! The comments of delegates that I spoke with and that other Committee members reported to me were invariably positive. The exhibitors were also enthusiastic about the meeting, and the general consensus was that it had been very worthwhile. Even the weather collaborated, although it was a bit too hot for me, particularly during the beautiful Concert in the Notre-Dame Basilica! I believe that this year’s Conference has set a new standard for the ISTM that future Organizing Committees will endeavour to replicate.

It goes without saying that the support of the Organizing Committee, the Scientific Committee, the speakers and poster presenters and Events International Team was a key element in the successful outcome of the Conference. I personally want to thank them all very sincerely. As I mentioned at the Closing Ceremonies, the outstanding logistical team on site gave me a tremendous feeling of confidence and security.

My deepest appreciation goes to the participants, all of whom played a part in ensuring the very positive outcome of CISTM6. Without their enthusiasm and active involvement in all the interactive sessions, the CISTM6 outcome would have left a very different feeling. I have one regret: I talked to a minuscule number! Each of my encounters with a participant from Ghana, Cambodia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, China, Brazil, India, Poland and so many other countries made such a durable impression. And so many friends I barely waved to! Bonjour à vous tous. I console myself with the certitude that many of you will be participants in other CISTM.

I look forward to seeing you again!
Au revoir, donc, et merci!

Body of Knowledge and Certificate of Knowledge Update

We would like to thank all 473 of you who took the time to fill out and return the “needs assessment” survey with regard to the proposed certificate of knowledge in travel medicine. There were certainly varying opinions with regard to an examination, though most were moderately to highly enthusiastic about moving ahead with our exploration. We have not yet thoroughly analysed the results of the survey, but will publish these when available in the next edition of NewsShare, and keep you up-to-date on the activities of the committee.

In the meanwhile, there were many excellent comments included on the survey responses, as well as several issues brought up by a number of members. We would like to address a few of the questions:

A “Certificate of Knowledge” would be awarded to those individuals who choose to sit and pass an exam. It is not a “certification” process nor is it credentialing. The ISTM is not a “Board” and our membership is international.

The exam would be purely voluntary, and would probably (at least initially) be given at the location of the ISTM Conference, either directly prior to, or after the meeting.

The exam would encompass pre-travel health issues. It would not test post-travel care. Thus, the same exam would be given to both nurses and physicians.

The committee exploring this issue is international in its composition, is multi disciplinary, consists of nurses and physicians, and is also aware of regional differences in travel health recommendations, cultural differences, etc.

The committee is making its best effort to communicate with national societies, as well with the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in an effort to best co-ordinate activities.

And finally, there is understanding concern from many with respect to moving ahead without a well defined “scope of practice” in travel medicine. It has therefore been the major thrust of the efforts of this committee and its professional consultants to first (and foremost) develop a “Body of Knowledge” outline for travel medicine. We feel that with a comprehensive body of knowledge document, professional educational efforts can move ahead more smoothly and more rapidly. In addition, this will enable better recognition of the many overlapping responsibilities of nurses and physicians practising travel medicine. The aim is to work together instead of becoming more fractionated.

The body of knowledge document is now in draft form and is undergoing evaluation and revision. Hopefully, it will be available for the next NewsShare as well. The items for inclusion are certainly not “set in stone” and serve only as guidelines for us in developing educational opportunities and standards of care.

Again, thank you for your assistance and we will be in touch with many of you during this process.

On behalf of the committee

ISTM - Nursing Task Force formally adjourned at CISTM6

In 1995, at the ISTM Acapulco Meeting, the Executive Board sanctioned the establishment of a Nursing Task Force. It was the objective of that time-limited, adhoc group to identify issues important to the Nursing members of the Society and to suggest methods by which those goals might be accomplished.

These original objectives of the Task Force were met during the period 1995-1999.

At the ISTM General Business Meeting and at the Executive Board meeting a recommendation was made and a petition was put forth to the Board to establish a committee on “Practice Issues”.

This new standing committee would incorporate the Task Force and expand its goals and membership into an interdisciplinary committee focused on issues of professional practice.

At the Executive Board meeting there was a great deal of discussion on this issue.

Members interested in this proposed committee were advised to become more involved in the professional education and training committee, perhaps as a subcommittee.

The proposed “Practice Issue” Committee was not empowered and the Nursing Task Force was adjourned.

Nursing Continuing Education Units (CEU's)

The Executive Board has passed a motion that the Board will always have a nurse holding a counselor position, and that counselor would be responsible for appointing the person to be in-charge of applying for CEU’s for Nurses for CISTM’s.

An intense effort will be put forth to apply for Nursing CEU’s for CISTM-7 in Innsbruck.

P.S. I would like to thank all the nurses who formed the Nursing Task Force and for the contributions made towards meeting the objectives over the past four years.