Volume 42 Number 1

Life Achievement Awards bestowed on WCET^® members

At the recently concluded World Union of Wound Healing Societies conference in Abu Dhabi, WCET^® members Dr Elizabeth A Ayello (USA), Professor Keryln Carville (Australia) and Professor R Gary Sibbald (Canada) were honoured for their extraordinary worldwide contribution to wound healing. Their Life Achievement Awards were presented during the WUWHS opening ceremony.

Other Life Achievement Awardees were Mrs Ellie Lindsay (UK), Dr Samir Mohamed Said Al Assar (UAE), Professor Zena Moore (Ireland), Professor Giovanni Mosti (Italy), Professor Hiroma Sanada (Japan), Professor Vijay K Shukla (India) and Dr Abbas G Zulfiqarali (Tanzania).

The WCET^® Journal congratulates all very worthy recipients.

IIWCC and WUWHS news 2022 – UAE is open!

On 10 February 2022 we received the happy news that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) continues to expand the countries from which persons can come from and enter into the UAE. Restrictions as to the number of persons who can attend the Congress have also been lifted. By the time you receive this journal issue, it is our hope that the delegates who have returned home from this international gathering of the World Union of Wound Healing Societies (WUWHS) 6th Congress held in Abu Dhabi, UAE, will look back on this experience with great joy.

The theme was Global Healing: Changing Lives. After postponing the WUWHS Congress by almost 2 years, the Congress was reformatted to be both an in-person and virtual format Congress in a hybrid format. Live streaming of the plenary session was an added bonus as we really felt that this was the only way to connect and integrate the world fully with what we are doing onsite. During the General Assembly meeting on Friday 4 March, five bids were presented for the next WUWHS Congress. We applaud WUWHS President Elect Dr Harikrishna K R Nair and the new team who will now be planning the 7th WUWHS Congress in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia which will run from 23-27 September 2026.

A comprehensive Congress report will follow in the next WCET^® Journal issue.

As for most of us, it has been challenging during these COVID-19 times. Nurses and other healthcare professionals have been working very long and difficult hours. The International Inter-professional Wound Care Group (IIWCG) has had to look for other ways of delivering its expert wound care education during the COVID-19 lockdown. In 2021, the IIWCG successfully continued its partnership with the International Interprofessional Wound Care Course (IIWCC) group from Canada and moved the course to a totally virtual format. Instead of having the students learning onsite at the Sheikh Khalifa Medical Center hospital in Abu Dhabi, classes were held totally on the Zoom electronic platform. We have just completed the study group of 2021/22 that was attended by the largest class ever in our teaching history in Abu Dhabi and welcomed a new intake of just more than 60 students for 2022. Moving the course to this virtual platform also had its challenges and required the team to work together and be creative. The course needed to accommodate students and faculty across the globe in different timezones; we thank our computer experts Ahmed and Andrew for technical support with this. We believe the solutions and new teaching format enhanced the educational experience and resulted in even more effective learning; student evaluations for the years 2020, 2021 and 2022 support this claim. The course was redesigned and redesigned again based on feedback from students. The patient cases were delivered via video vignettes, all structured according to the wound bed preparation paradigm.

As we are not all onsite for this teaching, and because the re-opening of UAE only occurred in the middle of February 2022, we are planning the next onsite IIWCG World Congress for 2023 in Abu Dhabi. In that conference we will graduate three sets of students coming from three classes (2020, 2021, 2022) in a formal graduation ceremony. That ceremony alone will be for more than 200 students! The Congress in 2023 will also be the start of IIWCG holding an annual wound conference to provide all IIWCC students with academic updates and possible master classes counting towards skill competencies.

We value our relationship with the WCET^® Journal as our official journal and aim to have the best academic selective studies published in WCET® Journal as soon as they are received in manuscript form from the students. Please stay tuned for more information with regards to the 2023 IIWCG conference where we hope to see many of you in person.

Gulnaz Tariq
President, International Inter-professional Wound Care Group

Hiske Smart
IIWCG WCET^® Journal Associate Editor

WOCNext^® 2022: A global event experienced your way

Registration is open

WOCNext^® 2022 is a global, hybrid event from WCET^® and WOCN^®, and serves as the annual conference for both organisations from 5–8 June 2022. All members of WCET^® and WOCN^®, and non-members, from around the globe are invited to join us in person or virtually. Register by 22 April to receive the Early Bird discounted rate.

Everyone from around the world is invited to celebrate diversity and gain perspectives that will advance the practice and delivery of wound, ostomy and continence care. It will aim to bring healing to the WOC and enterostomal therapy communities through global support and compassion for our unique and shared experiences. Event highlights include:

• Global perspectives.

• Parade of nations.

• Prominent topics.

• In person or virtual.

• Inclusive networking.

• All star speakers.

• Product innovations.

• Healing and energising activities.

The WOCNext^® 2022 Preliminary Event Program is now available to view. View our education sessions, networking opportunities, exhibit hall hours, and more. Keep checking for additional updates. Learn more at wocnext.org

If you plan on attending WOCNext^® in person, reserve your hotel room(s) by 6 May to receive the WOCNext^® group discount. WOCNext^® has partnered with multiple hotels in Fort Worth, Texas, for a variety of pricing options and locations close to the event space.

Interested in advertising during WOCNext^® 2022? View our prospectus to learn more about sponsorship opportunities. Please contact Chris Brown at cbrown@wocn.org.

Accreditation statement

The Wound, Ostomy, and Continence Nurses Society™ is accredited as a provider of nursing continuing professional development by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation. The Wound, Ostomy, and Continence Nurses Society™ is approved by the California Board of Registered Nursing, Provider Number CEP 15115.