Abstract
The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) at its General Assembly in Rome, 30 August 2016, created a new council with the aim of bringing together specialists working in the field of stroke. I was honoured to be invited by the ESC Board to become the first Council Chairman and I even had the unique opportunity to choose my closest co-workers for the council nucleus: Isabelle Van Gelder (cardiologist from Groningen, NL), Alison Halliday (vascular surgeon from Oxford, UK), Hans Christoph Diener (neurologist from Essen, DE), Mikael Mazighi (interventional neurologist from Paris, FR) and Wolfram Dohner (cardiologist from Berlin, DE).
This small group demonstrated much enthusiasm and hard work during the initial 4 months of the council life. We completed a campaign to increase awareness of the council among ESC members and invited them to join the council.
This resulted in 820 council members by the end 2016 and the membership continues to rise.