EUROPEAN  TISSUE  REPAIR  SOCIETY

Dear ETRS members

Last year we distributed a questionnaire amongst the membership of the ETRS, and on the website as well. The intention was to get some more insight in what our membership and others interested in ETRS activities consider important issues for the ETRS. Furthermore, we wanted to give you a direct means of communication with the Board and an opportunity to express your thoughts and ideas on what the ETRS should be and should do.

Here I present to you a summary of the outcome of that questionnaire.

Response

Forty-eight questionnaires were returned, from approximately 300 that were sent out, some accessed the questionnaire on the website.

Only members answered, 62.5% of the responders had been member for >5 years

ETRS membership

As the most important reason to become a member of the ETRS, those responding answered:

36% of responders: combination with Journal
20% of responders: reduced fee
18% of responders: access to network
16% of responders: ETRS Bulletin
9.5% of responders: other

As other reasons to become a member of the ETRS, the following were mentioned:

• create a forum for wound healing research,
• keep up to date in wound healing community,
• information about up to date issues in tissue repair,
• interest in basic science in tissue repair,
• to establish a bridge between China and the ETRS,
• interested in wound repair.

The main tasks of the ETRS were seen to be (percentages represent fraction of responders that judged the specific item relevant to highly relevant):

83% organize annual meeting
75% scientific network
62.5% development of clinical guidelines
58% clinical network
54% working groups
50% focused meetings

As other important ETRS tasks were mentioned develop scientific ideas through conferences organization of independent clinical research.

ETRS Meetings

87.5% of responders attended an ETRS meeting.
Timing of the meeting was mentioned as a main reason not to attend an ETRS annual meeting (6%).

ETRS Annual Meeting – programme

Around 50–60% of responders were satisfied with present arrangements.
The number of oral and teaching sessions was seen as (too) few (25–30%) rather than (too) many (10–15%).
The number of parallel sessions was judged as (too) many (27%) rather than (too) few (12%).

Industrial input

Around 50% of responders were satisfied with the level of industrial influence on ETRS activities and on the programme of the annual meetings.

35% of respondents judged the influence of industry on ETRS in general as high to too high.

And 39% of respondents judge the influence of industry on ETRS on the programme of ETRS meetings as high to too high.

Website

51% of responders judged quality and relevance of information on website as better than mean 35% judged this as mean.

Presentation of the information was judged as mean or better than mean by 83% of responders.

General

68% of responders judged the ETRS as relevant to highly relevant for their work.

Availability of ETRS officers was judged as mean (54%) or above mean (43%) by 97% of responders.

There were numerous suggestions on how to make the ETRS membership more attractive. I summarize here the subjects that were mentioned more frequently:

• explore possibilities to improve as a forum for networking, e.g., by establishing contact groups using email and news-mailing lists,
• improve student involvement, e.g., by having a young person/PhD student representative on the Board, and attract new topics and new presenters,
• financial triggers, such as special offers or reduced fees for registration and membership,
• more emphasis on basic science,
• more emphasis on clinical relevance,
• more clinical practical ‘back to practice’ lectures, tools on workshops,
• improvement in simple administrative areas, e.g., delays in subscriptions/receipts etc.

Overall, I think we have received a good impression of what you think about your Society and also we have received some very useful suggestions on how to improve the service of the ETRS to its members Although as in every questionnaire we have not received answers from all the members, we will certainly try to implement some of the suggestions in the near future

Thank you for your responses!

Beverwijk, 12 September 2004
Esther Middelkoop, Past President 2003–2004