Maarten van Kleef | Professor of Anaesthesiology and Pain Management University Hospital Maastricht (VUmc).

‘Younger colleagues were able to follow free refresher courses’

  Maarten van Kleef is Professor of Anaesthesiology and Pain Management at University Hospital Maastricht (VUmc). Together with colleague, Dr. Jan van Zundert, (Ziekenhuis Oost Limburg), he was able to bring the 7th World Congress of the World Institute of Pain to Maastricht in 2014. WIP 2014 was attended by 1790 international medical specialists in the field of Pain and Pain Management, including anaesthesiologists, neurosurgeons, rehabilitation specialists and psychologists. “Pain medicine is strongly growing during the last decade. Further professionalization of pain physicians, evidence-based diagnosis and treatment and improvement of skills were the main goals for this congress. The theme was evidence-based diagnostics and treatment of pain. What was special here was that younger colleagues had the opportunity to attend free on-going refresher courses. Organising such a conference in a smaller but attractive city requires much lobbying. It also took us years before we got the association to agree to come to Maastricht. They certainly did not regret it. On the contrary! Maastricht was the perfect location to organize such an event. Maastricht is an old Roman city and is located in the southern part of the The Netherlands, in the heart of Europe. In this wonderful environment, the World Institute of Pain organized the best scientific clinical World Congress on Pain possible at this moment.”