ALTEC - LATES

Dear colleague,
The Emergency Surgery Course (ESC), which is part of the ESTES and AAST portfolio, is an advanced two-day course aimed at general emergency surgeons, essentially interactive, based on the presentation and discussion of the most relevant topics in this area of General Surgery and on the discussion of related clinical cases.
The next edition in Portugal is planned for 19 and 20 September 2025, in Vila Real, for 24 candidates, and we would very much like to be able to count you among.

The registration fee is 450 € and includes a manual. Bank transfers, mentioning the candidate's name, medical career status and ESC, will be considered on a first-come, first-served basis. They will be processed through ALTEC's IBAN: PT50 0007 0229 0000 3180 0003 3
I would like to thank you in advance for any attention you may pay to this subject and for its dissemination.
Carlos Mesquita
General and Emergency Surgeon
ESC National Coordinator
Former ESTES President

Dear colleague,

A new Emergency Surgery Course (ESC, AAST/ESTES) is being organised and should take place in Viseu, Portugal, on 8th and 9th May 2025. I am therefore taking the liberty of asking for your co-operation in publicising the event among your close colleagues, especially seniors and residents from the last three years, given its advanced nature.

For replies, please use my personal email address, [email protected].

As in previous editions, the course will last two days, during which, under the guidance of accredited emergency surgeons, topics such as the following will be covered interactively and supported by concrete clinical cases, including operative videos:
• Abdominal sepsis
• Appendicitis
• Intestinal obstruction
• Cholecystitis
• Colorectal emergencies
• Gastrointestinal haemorrhage
• Mesenteric ischaemia
• Obstetric and gynaecological emergencies
• Open abdomen
• Necrotizing Soft-Tissue Infections
• Pancreatitis
• Peptic ulcer
• Post-operative complications
• Radiology in emergency surgery
• Spontaneous haemoperitoneum

The afternoon of the second day will be dedicated to evaluations.

Registration, priced at €450, will entitle you to a copy of ‘The AAST/ESTES Emergency Surgery Course Handbook - A Practical Reference In Expecting The Unexpected’, coordinated by Andrew (Andy) Peitzman, as well as catering for the course.

Without further ado, and grateful in advance for any cooperation you may be able to offer in promoting the course, please accept my best wishes.

Carlos Mesquita
General and Emergency Surgeon

EMERGENCY SURGERY SUBSPECIALITY IN PORTUGAL

After a long process of advances and setbacks, now 17 years old, the Portuguese Medical Association has just approved, together with the speciality of Emergency Medicine, the proposal to create the subspeciality of Emergency Surgery (in between, we had UEMS approve a similar proposal in two years and nine years ago, in 2015, on the initiative of the same group). With all those involved having many reasons to celebrate and certainly a lot of work ahead of them, the current board of the College of the Speciality of General Surgery, chaired by our colleague Jorge Paulino, is to be congratulated for its farsightedness and sense of timing. The creation of this subspeciality of Emergency Surgery is a very important step towards having well-coordinated emergency teams, especially with regard to traumatology, with increasingly accredited members.
It is important here to thank all those, foreign and national, who over the last quarter of a century have made themselves available to collaborate with us in the various training programmes that have progressively been implemented at national level, with emphasis on the work carried out within the Portuguese Society of Surgery (SPC) and the Lusitanian Association of Trauma and Emergency Surgery (ALTEC), institutional members of the European Society for Trauma and Emergency Surgery (ESTES): ATLS and TEAM (1999), DSTC (2003), DATC (2009), ETC (2009 / 2014), MRMI (2010), EASC and MUSEC (2013), CCRISP (2019) and ESC (2023), without forgetting, firstly, the international or foreign organisations behind each of them (1) and, secondly, that with DSTC also came DPNTC (2006), for operating theatre nurses (2) .
On the other hand, a great deal of knowledge has been acquired through exchanges with colleagues from other countries – come to mind, straight away, Brazil, the United States of America, Australia, Finland, Spain, Argentina, Greece, Singapore, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Netherlands, Sri Lanka, Canada, Austria, Poland, North Macedonia, Albania, Qatar and soon Uruguay – which have opened doors for us with invitations to work with them.
The recognition of this subspecialty (the first in our context of the General Surgery specialty) is a kind of icing on the cake in a particularly happy year, 2024, during which we were able to host and chair the European Congress of Trauma and Emergency Surgery (ECTES 2024) in Estoril, organised as part of ESTES. In three-dimensional conceptual terms, it completes a tetrahedron of competences, making it possible to add to the existing intensive training processes, geared towards 1) essential individual action, 2) team action and 3) specialised action, 4) a real continuous training process. As far as I know, at global level, only Brazil, in Campinas, has managed to bring together the four faces of this tetrahedron.
So let's take the opportunity to celebrate all this with honour.
Carlos Mesquita

Footnotes
(1) Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) and Trauma Evaluation and Management (TEAM), American College of Surgeons (ACS) / Definitive Surgical Trauma Care (DSTC) and Definitive Anaesthetic Trauma Care (DATC), International Association for Trauma Surgery and Intensive Care (IATSIC) / European Trauma Course (ETC), European Trauma Course Organization (ETCO) / Medical Response to Major Injuries (MRMI), European Society for Trauma and Emergency Surgery (ESTES) and Medical Response to Major Injuries and Disasters Association (MRMIDA) / Emergency Abdominal Surgery Course (EASC), Donegal Clinical and Research Academy (DCRA) and World Society of Emergency Surgery (WSES) / Modular UltraSound ESTES Course (MUSEC), ESTES / Care of the Critically Ill Surgical Patient (CCRISP), Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) / Emergency Surgery Course (ESC), ESTES and American Association for the Surgery of Trauma (AAST).
(2) Definitive Perioperative Nurses Trauma Care (DPNTC), linked to the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS).