The 15th Bergmeyer Conference

The Scientific Division of the International Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (IFCC) is committed to promoting high standards and laboratory medicine on an international basis and disseminating the results of emerging research to ensure early adoption of good practice for the benefit of patients. To further these objectives, the division organizes Bergmeyer Conferences on a two-yearly basis. Conferences are devoted to a key topic of current interest in laboratory medicine, and provide a forum for invited experts to share recent innovation and emerging findings and to discuss areas of controversy and highlight future needs.

The Bergmeyer conferences are dedicated to the memory of Prof Hans-Ulrich Bergmeyer [1] and honour his outstanding achievements in biochemistry and the area of standardization. The series began 28 years ago and is still generously fully sponsored by Roche Diagnostics, although the programme is selected entirely independently by the IFCC. The previous Bergmeyer conferences are shown in Table 1.

Table 1. Bergmeyer conferences 1988–2016.

1988	Principles of assays in medical sciences
1989	Laboratory measurements in lipid disorders
1990	Immunoassay standardization
1992	Proposals for two immunomethod reference systems: cortisol and human chorionic gonadotropin
1994	Tumor markers
1996	Biochemical markers of bone diseases
1999	Markers of cardiac damage
2001	Biochemical markers for autoimmune diseases
2003	Nucleic acid markers for bacterial and viral infections in intensive care and immune-compromised patients
2005	Diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular disease
2008	Markers of kidney disease
2010	Novel biomarkers: from discovery to clinical application
2012	Vitamin D in Health and Disease
2014	Women’s health
2016	Biomarkers in the Diagnosis and Monitoring of Cancer

The 15th Bergmeyer conference (7–9 March 2016) was entitled ‘Biomarkers in the Diagnosis and Monitoring of Cancer’ and was focused on the impact of new and emerging technologies and the potential which they offer to improve patient care. Speakers addressed both specific cancers and specific technologies and biomarkers, as well as discussing some of the broader economic and ethical challenges which are emerging in the era of personalized cancer care. As in previous years, a distinguished multidisciplinary panel of speakers was joined by an invited audience of laboratory professionals who contributed to the high-level discussion which characterizes the Bergmeyer conference.

With a small number of exceptions, articles based on the presentations given at the conference are presented in this issue. They provide a strong overview of key issues in the field and will hopefully provide both a useful resource and a useful summary of the current state of knowledge in this important area.

As for all the previous Conferences, Anders Kallner again took over the main responsibility of editing these proceedings, and is joined by Joseph Lopez and Leslie Lai who also helped to put discussions in their proper context. Paola Bramati at the IFCC office supported the organization of the scientific aspects of the Conference. Last but not least, Joe Passarelli and his staff carried the burden of organizing the Conference in Eibsee, Germany, and in achieving, once again, an outstanding meeting.