Top picks from the ERS leadership - ERS Congress 2025

As ERS President, what are you looking forward to most about this year’s ERS Congress?

Our annual ERS Congress is the outstanding highlight in the calendar of our Society. It shows cutting-edge, high-quality research, provides us with the latest advances in the management of respiratory diseases, and enables professionals to share best practices.

Furthermore, the ERS Congress offers an unparalleled opportunity to foster collaborations and inspire new partnerships that will drive the future of respiratory health. In my role as ERS President, I am also excited to engage with our members travelling from all over the world to the congress, hear their insights, and discuss the strategic goals and direction of our Society.

The beautiful and vibrant city of Amsterdam provides the ideal location to host our Congress and I have no doubt that the event will be a great success!

How important is the theme of this year’s Congress – ‘Respiratory health around the globe’?

Respiratory diseases remain among the leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Addressing this dramatic burden requires global collaboration, knowledge sharing, and equitable access to care.

We all have a collective responsibility to advance respiratory health; not just in Europe, but everywhere – bridging gaps, strengthening systems, and ensuring that innovation benefits all populations. This year’s Congress theme is both timely and essential, it is a call to action for a truly global response to the global challenges of respiratory diseases and highlights ERS’s commitment to play a key role in that response.

What will be the hot topics to look out for at this year’s Congress? Within those topics/areas, are there any specific sessions that you are looking forward to most?

With the diverse range of excellent sessions and workshops it is certainly not easy to highlight some topics over others.

I would like to draw, however, particular attention to the sessions focusing on our congress theme ‘Respiratory health around the globe’. These will provide us with the opportunity to obtain state-of-the art information and to critically discuss key topics ranging from the influence of global risk factors on respiratory and general health, the many disparities around the world, over experiences and challenges of those being affected to the potential global, patient-centred solutions.

I would also like to highlight the exciting diverse portfolio of the Wednesday special sessions, which among others include an ERS/ELF collaborative session on primary prevention of respiratory diseases, one of the strategic focus areas of our Society.

I also encourage all ERS members to join us at the meeting of the General Assembly (Tuesday 30 September, 14:00–15:30 CEST) to ensure that you are informed of the current activities and directions of the Society and that your voice is heard.

What will be the key sessions for sleep-disordered breathing specialists?

Yet again, we can look forward to an exciting programme addressing the multitude of hot topics of our field. I specifically wish to highlight the following:

• Hot topics session Understanding disease variability and its impact on the management of obstructive sleep apnoea – 28 September, 13:45–15:15 CEST
  The session will critically discuss the growing body of evidence of night-to-night variability of sleep apnoea which is important in the diagnostic evaluation and in the subsequent management of the condition. We will also hear about variability in cardiometabolic responses to CPAP therapy, an aspect which must be incorporated into personalised treatment approaches.
• Poster session Different clinical aspects of sleep and obstructive sleep apnoea according to gender, anthropometrics and symptoms (28 September, 08:00–09:30 CEST) and Mini-Symposium Sex differences in sleep-disordered breathing: how do they influence diagnostics and treatment recommendations? (30 September, 15:30–17:00 CEST)
  There are substantial gender-related disparities in obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) in terms of clinical presentation, treatment responses, recognition of the disease and access to specialised centres and there is still limited recognition of this subject. These sessions will summarise our current knowledge and highlight any gaps, provide new data, and discuss the research agenda for the future. Addressing those issues is crucial towards precision medicine and ensuring equality.
• Oral Presentation Emerging insights in diagnosis and treatment of sleep-disordered breathing (29 September, 14:15–15:30 CEST)
  We can look forward to hearing high-quality research focusing on innovative treatment approaches of OSA. Furthermore, the session will feature the alarming trajectories of the prevalence of OSA in Europe and the negative impact of rising temperatures on the global burden of the disease.

Well, I simply cannot wait for the Congress to start! It will be an invaluable opportunity to gain new insights, enhance clinical skills, explore latest technologies, and thus, will greatly contribute to the advancement of respiratory health.