The postgraduate course in Pediatric Cardiovascular Disease organized by Children's Hospital of Philadelphia for 2006, therefore, was held in the balmy setting of Scottsdale, Arizona. This marked the ninth consecutive year that the team from Philadelphia has gathered an international and multidisciplinary faculty to provide a comprehensive update on issues in the delivery of pediatric cardiovascular care. This move to Arizona, after eight consecutive highly successful years in Orlando, marks the change to an ongoing plan to alternate every other year between programmes in Orlando, Florida and Scottsdale, Arizona. The part of the joint programme to be organized by the Congenital Heart Institute of Florida will continue to take place in St. Petersburg, including the years when the part designed by Philadelphia will be held in Arizona, as will occur in 2008. Even during these years when the Philadelphia meeting is held in Arizona, “Heart Week” will continue to be a collaborative project as manifest by the collaborative publication of this Supplement, as well the various shared international faculty members. As is stated on the web site for the programme coordinated by Philadelphia, “Providing optimal care for neonates, children and young adults with heart disease requires a multidisciplinary team approach, including physicians (from cardiology, cardiac surgery, cardiothoracic anesthesia, neonatal and pediatric critical care medicine, and multiple consulting services), nurses, perfusionists, respiratory therapists, social workers and many others. All of these various practitioners must be experts in their own area, but should also be knowledgeable in what the other members of the team provide to the overall care of the patient.” This statement presents the rationale for not only the annual part of the meeting emanating from Philadelphia, but also for “Heart Week in Florida”. A highlight of the meeting organized by Children's Hospital of Philadelphia is the featured lectures in Cardiology, Cardiac Surgery, and Nursing (Table 1). As usual, this year, in Scottsdale, the lectures were of unanimously outstanding quality.
Table 1. The Featured Lectures given thus far during the Annual Postgraduate Course in Pediatric Cardiovascular Disease organized by Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
In 2006, the component of the joint programme organized by the Congenital Heart Institute of Florida, along with All Children's Hospital, and representing their own sixth annual International Symposium on Congenital Heart Disease, was held one week subsequent to the meeting in Arizona, but was also blessed with wonderful weather, and awesome presentations from the stellar faculty. In Table 2, I highlight the featured topics and speakers from the meeting held in St. Petersburg. The true summit of this meeting is the George Daicoff Lecture, given by the featured speaker so as to honour the founder of our surgical programme in St. Petersburg. We have now reached the situation whereby the proceedings of the meetings held in 2003, 2004, and 2005 have been published as supplements to Cardiology in the Young.1–3 This supplement is the second we have produced jointly with Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, our first joint effort gathering together the written account of the activities of the meeting held in 2004.2
Table 2. Featured topics and speakers during the symposiums organized by the Congenital Heart Institute of Florida and All Children's Hospital.
It is gratifying for me, as a representative of the Congenital Heart Institute of Florida, to confirm our ongoing commitment to continue “Heart Week in Florida”, combining the International Symposium on Congenital Heart Disease organized by All Children's Hospital and The University of South Florida with the annual postgraduate course in Pediatric Cardiovascular Disease organized by Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. I thank Gil Wernovsky, Director of the meeting organized by Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, as well as Tina Mannices, Manager of Continuing Medical Education at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and also Tom Spray and Bill Gaynor, for their support. For 2007, the two meetings will come together again in Florida. The part to be held in St Petersburg will take place from February 16 through 20, 2007, and will focus on hypoplastic left heart syndrome, with a special one day mini-symposium about adults with congenital heart disease. The tenth update provided by Children's Hospital of Philadelphia will be held in Orlando on February 21 through 25, 2007. This meeting will once again provide a comprehensive post-graduate course for pediatric cardiologists, neonatologists, surgeons, nurses, intensivists, anesthesiologists, sonographers, perfusionists. In essence, it will provide something for all those involved in the care of neonates and children with cardiovascular disease. The drive from Saint Petersburg to Orlando is only 90 minutes, and the programme has been designed to provide ample time for those attending both segments to make this short transfer.
The Supplement that you are now about to read, therefore, focuses on Controversies and Challenges of the Atrioventricular Junctions and Other Challenges Facing Pediatric Cardiovascular Practitioners and their Patients. It has four sections, which have been prepared so as to give a flavour of the presentations given in Florida and Arizona in February of 2006. The reviews in the first part discuss the anatomy, along with diagnostic and therapeutic strategies, related to the atrioventricular valves, with manuscripts covering the tricuspid valve, the mitral valve, and the common atrioventricular valve. In the second part, attention is given to the anatomy, nomenclature, echocardiographic evaluation, and treatment of patients with discordant atrioventricular connections. In the third part, our chosen experts address the long-term outcomes for patients subsequent to treatment for their congenital cardiac malformations. In our final part, we have gathered together additional reviews of miscellaneous topics given that were simply too good to be excluded.
Over the years, Heart Week in Florida has provided many opportunities for the excellent scientific exchange of ideas, and the development of awesome friendships (Fig. 1). I would like to thank Bob Anderson for all of his help, support, trust, and patience during the preparation of this Supplement. I would also like to thank my good friends and co-editors of this Supplement, Gil Wernovsky and J. William Gaynor. I am especially grateful to Jean Francis and Michael Epstein, Vice Presidents of All Children's Hospital, for facilitating the publication of this Supplement. I would also like to thank several additional members of our team at All Children's Hospital, namely Gary Carnes, President and Chief Executive Officer of All Children's Hospital, Joel Momberg, Cindy Rose, Pat Clark, Melodye Seals, Ron Volden, Tina Merola, Kas Sheehan, and all our cardiac nurses. Further thanks are due to the other Directors of our St. Petersburg meeting, namely James C. Huhta, Richard Martinez, David Cooper, and my partner James A. Quintessenza. Jim Huhta initiated this meeting, and I am grateful that he gave me the opportunity to work with him. The meeting would not have been possible without his leadership and vision. Finally, I would like to thank my current partners, Jim Quintessenza, Paul Chai, and Harald Lindberg, and my former partner Victor Morell, for their constant support and guidance, and my wife Stacy, and children Jessica and Joshua, for their understanding and patience. It continues to be an ongoing fact, as I have emphasized in previous introductions, that all of the family members of the authors of the reviews included in this Supplement are owed a debt of gratitude, because writing manuscripts markedly decreases the time available with them. Unfortunately, even with the passage of time, these periods of writing and editing are showing no signs of disappearance.
Figure 1. Over the years, Heart Week in Florida has provided many opportunities for the excellent scientific exchange of ideas and the development of awesome friendships, as demonstrated by this photograph showing Bob Anderson, during a business meeting held at Heart Week in Florida, appointing Gil Wernovsky to be the Editor with responsibility for the supplements of Cardiology in the Young.
