I was born in 1966 and graduated in Medicine from Hacettepe University, Ankara. After having completed my internal medicine fellowship in Ankara University I received a scholarship from the Austrian government and worked in Vienna.

Upon my return I completed the Hematology programme at Ankara University, which houses the largest and most active transplant center in Turkey. I worked as attending physician both for the hemapheresis and transplant unit and after having completed my hematology training I continued working as a consultant physician both for the hemapheresis unit and transplant outpatient clinic.

In 2004 I was appointed as Associate Professor at Ankara University Faculty of Medicine. Currently our centre is transplanting more than 100 patients per annum and represents Turkey for international transplant related clinical research. I have realized that due to the growing experience of our transplant centre we have been confronted with more and more late effects and it is an area of great interest to me personally.

I have been actively involved in the EBMT since 2000. As one of the co-founders and data manager of the Turkish Transplant Registry I have been active in the EBMT Registry Subcommittee. I subsequently entered the Late Effects Working Party and have been an active member since then. I am currently running the Bronchiolitis Obliterans Syndrome (BOS) Survey, a retrospective study which will include the data of over 200 BOS patients.

I am a relatively young and new member of the Late Effects Working Party, which is always a friendly, scientifically alert and collaborative group. I thank all the experienced members of the LEWP, who have encouraged me to stand for election. As a member of the LEWP I would like to underline the following important topics for development:

I graduated from the Medical Faculty at Geneva University in 1976 and performed my general medical training at different hospitals in the French and German part of Switzerland. In 1984, I joined the division of Hematology and the Hemopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation (HSCT) team in Basel, where I completed my training in hematology. Since 1991, I have been the head of the Haematological Laboratory at the University of Basel, which includes responsibility for haemopoietic stem cell engineering.

My special interest in HSCT is long-term survivorship, involving late effects, general health status and Quality of Life in long-term survivors. My research work focuses mainly on late effects such as ocular complications, vascular events, long-term chimerism, fertility and secondary cancers. As a result of the particular interest of the Division of Hematology Basel in the pathogenesis and treatment of Severe Aplastic Anemia (SAA), I also focus on the long-term follow-up of SAA patients treated with HSCT or immunosuppression.

I am currently the Secretary of the Late Effects Working Party (LEWP) and since 1991 have actively participated in a number of EBMT projects with both the LEWP and the SAA WP. As one of the candidates for chair of the Late Effects Working Party, my aims are to:

• Develop prospective and retrospective collaborative studies and continue those initiated during the chairmanship of Gérard Socié.
• Establish a scientific platform within the Late Effects WP for young researchers willing to undertake or to participate in high level studies and publications.
• Improve the quality of data needed for collaborative, high quality studies and publications in the Late Effect WP.
• Carry on the interactions undertaken by the actual chairman and intensify close collaboration with expert groups in cancer survivorship such as the IBMTR and the ASBMT.
• Maintain active collaboration with the different WP's according to the needs of Late Effects WP projects.

The Late Effect WP covers a fascinating field in HSCT. It allows us to explore whether the common aim established by the patient and his/her transplant team, i.e. to obtain a long-term disease free survival with normal health status, an optimal quality of life and a complete social integration is achieved. To chair the Late Effects WP is an enormous commitment, but I would consider it a great honour to provide my active participation in this WP and be glad to face this exciting challenge.

André Tichelli
tichelli@datacomm.ch