IGCS Programs for Early Career Members
Dear Colleagues,
The exponential growth and success the IGCS have experienced over the last three years from my perspective has been through our unique membership strategic partner model and initiating programs that meet the needs of our members. One of the greatest growth areas has been and will continue to be those early in their careers from both high and low resource settings.
Our society’s greatest strength is our membership. IGCS is made up of over 2,750 gynecologic oncologists, medical oncologists, pathologists, radiation oncologists, surgical oncologists, allied health professionals, fellows and residents all dedicated to treating women’s cancer. The leadership of the IGCS feels strongly in investing resources into our early career members and guiding them through professional development of advanced skills in leadership, research, publication and clinical practice. I feel confident we are investing in the future leaders of our society and specialty through the following programs for our early career members.
International Visiting Scholar and Mentorship Program
The goal is to provide mentorship opportunities for early career members seeking to learn a very specific skill not available at their institution or region. Through this program many young doctors in low resource settings are afforded the opportunity to travel to foreign institutions to obtain advanced training in a number of skill sets.
With this new launch of the Visiting Scholar and Mentorship Program under the director of Dr. Vivek Arora, it is our goal to foster long-term mentoring relationships with an aim of narrowing, and eventually eliminating, the gaps in provision of healthcare to women diagnosed with gynecological cancer across different regions of the world.
Click here to see the 2019 Visiting Scholars.
Shingo Fujii Young Doctors Summit Travel Grants
Since 2012, funding has been provided for selected young doctors from low resource settings to attend the IGCS Meeting through the Shingo Fujii Young Doctors Summit Travel Grant. In 2012 the grants were funded with a generous donation from Prof. Shingo Fujii with the goal of bringing together young doctors from around the world for a day of education and networking. Dr. Fujii wanted to invest our young members and encourage them to form lifelong collaborative relationships with their international colleagues. A special thank you to Ane Gerda Erikson for taking the time to review all the outstanding applications.
Those selected to receive funding to attend the 2019 IGCS Global Meeting can be found here.
NEW: Early Career Research and Publication Network
Dr. Robert Coleman, IGCS President Elect is also extremely committed to the success and development of our early career members. He has conceptualized a network to engage our early career members providing mentorship, discussion and collaboration specifically around research project ideas and the importance of publishing and writing. Early career members will participate in the network via video conference, online discussion boards and in-person meetings at the IGCS Annual Global Meeting.
This network is still in its early stages and mentors for the network will include Sean Dowdy from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester MN, Ioana Braicu from Berlin, Germany and Francesco Plotti from Rome, Italy with Council oversight from Rob. I am grateful for their willingness to participate and mentor our early career members. Please watch for further developments as we share more information on the IGCS home page and via email when it is available. I am hopeful our early career professionals will sign up for participation.
As I reflect on the current state of the IGCS, I am so pleased to see all that we are doing to support and equip the future generation of our specialty. We could not do it without our dedicated multidisciplinary team of volunteer leaders working as mentors, faculty, content creators, and idea generators!
If you would like to become more involved in IGCS’s mentorship, training, and educational initiatives in any capacity, please contact our CEO mary.eiken@igcs.org. We welcome your participation.
I wish you all well and hope to continue this conversation at our Global Annual Meeting in Rio de Janeiro later this year.
Sincerely,
Roberto Angioli, MD
2018-2020 IGCS President