37^th International
Gastrointestinal Surgery Workshop

To successfully guide a group of renowned and autonomous surgeons into a “Unité de Doctrine” is this other outstanding achievement of Professor Martin Allgöwer. It has to be mentioned that the “all layer” and “one row” suture technique, which then became the Davos Suture Technique, was so compelling, simple, safe, that not only the personality of Martin Allgöwer, but the issue itself slowly convinced all members of the Founding Faculty, resulting eventually in a “Unité de Doctrine”. Thus the Davos Suture Courses were born. They grew and expanded continually not only by an increase at each course from initially 80 to presently 260 participants but also by drawing up new training programmes, automatic suture devices included in the training range and eventually the course was extended to include the newly developing laparoscopic techniques. Having celebrated its 25th anniversary - the quarter century of existence - in 2008, the GI-Courses have reached an important milestone. The organisers and successors of the founders are very keen to continue this ambiguous project into the second quarter century by improving the standards continuously in accordance with the latest standards of education in GI-surgery. In this respect the virtual reality training (VRT) has been implemented successfully in the regular course program and most recently the new advanced course was introduced with great success.

The Foundation for Gastroenterological Surgery is a not-for-profit organization that aims to provide practical education to young surgeons in training. Each year, the foundation organises an internationally renowned course where abdominal surgical techniques are taught with lectures and skills workshops. 

Since its inauguration in 1989, the Foundation for Gastroenterological Surgery has been seated at the Research Institute of the AO-Foundation in Davos, Switzerland, which is an institution accredited and controlled by the Swiss government. 

In June 2009, the Foundation for Gastroenterological Surgery has become affiliated to the Academia Raetica. This academy acts as an umbrella organisation for several highly qualified research institutes and public hospitals within the Canton of Grisons, Switzerland. The academy supports and coaches postgraduate education and fosters interdisciplinary research and networking within the associated institutions. The academy may promote doctorates.

Members of the Board of Directors, the Course Faculty, and the Instructors group respectively, are independent and active surgeons who have leadership functions in different European hospitals. These surgeons contribute to the annual course with their presence and experience and do not receive any honorarium for their work.

The annual practical course is held in the Davos Convention Centre. Davos is known to be the highest located congress town in Europe and repeatedly hosts famous international congresses. The population of the Davos community is the owner of the Convention Centre. Therefore, the Convention Centre business is run in a not-for-profit manner and is able to offer a very low rental fee to the Foundation for Gastroentero- logical Surgery. Hotels and other housing facilities in Davos are offering quite low rates compared with other congress cities in Switzerland.

The committee organizing the course (e.g. the Faculty and Board of Directors) has freedom in designing the scientific program and the practical exercises. The committee does not have any commitments to the industry partners at the course.

The course faculty is promoting surgical skills training, surgical research and academic development. In this respect, several peer-reviewed manuscripts, written by members of the faculty have been published in the medical literature so far.

The annual course provides a fully scheduled and structured education throughout the whole six days. Besides practical exercises, theoretical lectures and interactive case- based discussions are provided.

All finances of the course are freely available to the sponsoring companies. Accounts, balances and projected budgets are transparently discussed with the industry partners. Financial statements are reviewed and approved by a trust company and all records of the course organization are freely available on request.