Donald E. Fry, M.D.

Biography: 

Dr. Fry is the Executive Vice-President of MPA Healthcare Solutions of Chicago. He is Professor Emeritus of Surgery from the University of New Mexico, School of Medicine where he was the Chairman of the Department of Surgery for over 16 years. He is currently an Adjunct Professor of Surgery at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. He and Rosemary have been married for 49 years and have two children (Angela and Matthew).

Dr. Fry completed his B.Sc. and M.D. degrees from The Ohio State University. He completed his general surgery residency at the University of Louisville in Louisville, Kentucky. Dr. Fry has authored over 300 journal publications, over 140 book chapters, and edited 10 books. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the journals Surgical Infections and Surgical Infections Case Reports. Dr. Fry is Board Certified by the American Board of Surgery, and has been recertified in 1988, 1998, and 2008. He is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, a member of the American Surgical Association, and a Fellow of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. He is past-president of the Association of VA Surgeons, the Shock Society, and the Surgical Infection Society of North America. He received the Career Achievement Award from the Ohio State University College of Medicine and Public Health in 1997. He has had a career interest in clinical infectious disease and the septic response in the surgical patient. New interests include objective measures of clinical outcomes, healthcare models for payment reform, and strategies to realign physician incentives for quality and efficiency in the delivery of care.

Kamal M. F. Itani, MD

Biography: 

Kamal M. F. Itani, MD is the Chief of surgical services at the VA Boston Health Care System, a Professor of Surgery at Boston University, faculty member at Harvard Medical School.

Dr Itani is a member of various surgical organizations and has served in various leadership positions in these organizations. He is currently the President of The Surgical Infection Society, Chair of the research Committee of the American College of Surgeons and is past President of the Association of VA Surgeons. He is an editorial board member of JAMA surgery, the American Journal of Surgery and Surgical Infection.

Dr. Itani’s primary clinical research interest is in surgical infections and health services research including surgical outcomes and clinical trials. He is the author or co-author of more than 250 peer-reviewed publications. His book on “clinical trials in operative and non-operative invasive procedures” published in 2017 is considered a key reference in surgical clinical trials.

Malin Sund, MD/PhD

Professor of Surgery, Umeå University

Biography: 

Malin Sund received her M.D. in 1998, and a PhD in molecular biology in 2001 from the University of Oulu, Finland. During 2003-2005 she worked as a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School and Division of Matrix Biology in Boston, USA. She received her surgical training at the University of Umeå, Sweden between 2006-2012, and became associate professor in experimental surgery in 2009. She was appointed as Professor of surgery at Umeå University in 2013. Her research interests are within the field of tumour stroma and cancer cell interactions, cancer epidemiology and novel cancer biomarkers especially in the context of pancreatic, breast- and colorectal cancer. She is a current editor of BJS, International secretary of the Swedish Surgical Society and Secretary of the Section of Surgery within UEMS in Europe. She is also the vice-chairman of the research council of the Swedish Cancer Society. 

Massimo Sartelli

Biography: 

Dr Massimo Sartelli is consultant surgeon at Department of General and Emergency Surgery, Macerata Hospital, Area Vasta 3, ZT n°9 (Italy) – Coordinator of Scientific Activities – Member of the Hospital Infection Control Committee. In the last years he has devoted his updating to the study of surgical infections and sepsis.

He coordinated WSES Guidelines for Management of Intra-abdominal Infections, WSES Guidelines for Management of Skin and Soft Tissue Infections and WSES Guidelines for Management of Clostridium difficile Infection in Surgical Patients.

He designed and coordinated three multicenter prospective studies (CIAOW Study, CIAO Study and WISS Study) involving medical institutions worldwide defining epidemiological and management profiles of intra-abdominal infections worldwide.

Massino is deputy editor of the “World Journal of Emergency Surgery” and member of the Board of Directors of the “World Society of Emergency Surgery”. He is  also the founder and acting director of the Global Alliance for Infections in Surgery.

Jan De Waele

Biography: 

Jan De Waele is a surgery-trained intensivist and works at the surgical ICU of the Ghent University Hospital in Belgium. Clinical interests include infection management in the critically ill patient, including antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial stewardship in the ICU. His research activities currently focus on optimizing antibiotic therapy in severely ill infected patients to improve outcome and combat resistance development.

He holds a Sr. Clinical Investigator Fellowship Grant from the Research Foundation Flanders to investigate optimization of antibiotic therapy in critically ill patients, and is currently chairing the Infection Section of the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine (ESICM).

Ben Saleem

Vascular surgeon, the Netherlands

Biography: 

In his PhD thesis (October, 2017) Ben Saleem searched for an accurate diagnostic tool to predict whether a vascular graft is infected or not as clinical symptoms are often not specific. Vascular graft infection occurs infrequently, yet the natural course may be devastating and potentially life threatening. An accurate diagnostic tool is necessary because a false-negative test result may refrain the patient from proper antibiotic or surgical treatment. Otherwise, a false-positive test may result in unneeded extensive surgical procedures.

Ben Saleem, MD PhD, is a vascular surgeon working at the University Medical Center Groningen and Ommelander Hospital Groningen since 2016. He has a specific interest in hybrid vascular procedures and treatment of vascular prosthetic graft infections. 

Anastasia Antoniadou

Biography: 

Anastasia Antoniadou was born in Cyprus and studied Medicine at the School of Medicine of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (1977-1984), from where she also received her PhD. She was trained in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases in Athens (1st Dpt of Propedeutic Medicine, Laiko Hospital) and for a short period of time in Texas (Infectious Diseases Dpt and Mycology Lab MDΑnderson Cancer Center Houston and Fungus Testing Lab., San Antonio).  Currently she is an Associate Professor in Athens School of Medicine positioned at the University General Hospital ATTIKON in Athens, engaged in clinical (attending physician and ID consultant), educational (4th and 6th grade medical students and residents in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases) and research activities (clinical research in HIV and Infectious diseases)

Areas of special interest:

Infections in immunocompromised patients, HIV Infection, fungal infections, Health-care associated infections, antibiotic policies and antibiotic stewardship, infections during pregnancy.

She is a member of the Infection Control Committee of the University Hospital ATTIKON and coordinator of the antibiotic team, a member of the committee for the rational use of antibiotics at KEELPNO, Head of the HIV Unit at University General Hospital ATTIKON and a member of the steering committee of the Greek HIV cohort AMACS. A member also of the group of external experts for the ECDC and until 2014 National focal point for the ESAC –NET for antibiotic consumption. She is a member of several scientific societies (including IDSA, ESCMID, EACS and ESCIM) with 133 publications in peer-review journals

Joesph Solomkin

Biography: 

Joseph Solomkin is  Professor Emeritus  in the Department of Surgery, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Ohio, USA. Educated at Harvard College, Massachusetts, he studied medicine at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York. He obtained his surgical training at the University of Minnesota School of Medicine, Minnesota. Professor Solomkin has published extensively on the mechanisms and management of surgical infection. He has been involved in the evaluation of a range of antimicrobial agents and in the development of guidelines for the selection of anti-infective agents for the treatment of surgical infections. Membership of several learned societies includes the American College of Surgeons, the Society for Critical Care Medicine, the American Society for Microbiology, the Infectious Diseases Society of America and the Society for Leukocyte Biology.  Professor Solomkin is currently CEO of OASIS Global, a non-profit organisation working to lower the incidence of post-surgical infection in low and middle income countries. He was also chair of the Guideline Development Group for the WHO Guideline on the Prevention of Surgical Site Infection.

Nikolaos Danias

Biography: 

Assistant Professor of Surgery, Athens Medical School

Nikolaos Oikonomopoulos

Biography: 

Consultant Radiologist, since 1996, in 2nd Department of Radiology University of Athens, Greece.

Specialty: CT-MR imaging of the abdomen, including routine and advanced radiological examinations, emergency room.

Academic activity: Teaching Radiology in students and trainees of Radiology.

Scientific work: Over 35 publications in international literature.