My name is Soji Ozawa, Chairman and Professor of Department of Gastroenterological Surgery, Tokai University School of Medicine. It is my great pleasure to host the 18th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society of Gastroenterological Surgery (JSGS), which is to be held in Kobe in November, 2020.

There have been two previous Presidents of the JSGS Annual Meetings from Tokai University: the late Prof. Toshio Mitomi and Prof. Hiroyasu Makuuchi organized the 45th and the 61st General Meeting, respectively. It is such a great honor to follow in these great footsteps for the upcoming JDDW.

JSGS has a long history of holding the scientific meetings twice a year, with one being held in the summer and one in the fall. Each of these meetings comprises of main sessions, which focus on timely issues to grow our expertise in gastroenterological diseases.

We also have a history of promoting the internationalization. In recent years, have we required our Symposium Sessions to be conducted in English, as these are important opportunities which enable us to show the state of the art of gastroenterological surgery in Japan to the world.

For the 18th Annual Meeting, we are planning to have a range of themes which are uniquely relevant to surgery. Cutting edge modes of therapy which are of great interest to many surgeons, such as “Robotic Surgery” and “Clinical Application of Navigation Surgery,” will be covered, as well as areas which require further validation and debate, including “Treatment Strategies for Advanced Cancer” and “Perioperative Management.” Each session will be led by experts from Japan and overseas.

Furthermore, taking full advantage of this precious opportunity of five societies all getting together at the same time, presentations on some session themes will be offered across the fields of internal medicine and surgery. This reflects our fundamental intent for this Meeting, which is to achieve our point of origin and final goal of curing patients’ gastroenterological diseases.

We hope to make JDDW 2020 a forum for broad-ranging debates on the diagnosis and treatment of gastroenterological diseases, which will provide great insights and tools for the clinical practice of tomorrow. We are looking forward to your abstracts submitted and attendance, and most of all, we hope to gather and strengthen our friendship in Kobe.