We have just closed a very succesful Annual Congress in Amsterdam and we thank the Local Organising Team, under the leadership of Prof Gertjan Kaspers and Prof Rob Pieters and our Scientific Committe, under the leadership of Dr Asim Belgaumi as well as all our speakers and delegates for making this a memorable event for all of us.
If you were not able to join us in person, you can still access the on-demand recordings on our virtual congress platform here (registration required; incl. for onsite and online attendees).Please note that as a SIOP member, you can access all videos for free from SIOP CONNECT as of Jan 2026 (part of your SIOP membership benefits). However, if you choose to access the recordings via SIOP CONNECT in Jan 2026, you will not be able to get CME credits. CME credits can be claimed here.
Photos and videos from the conference will be available shortly on our congress website as well.

We would also like to share the final online voting results of our Annual Business Meeting with you and thank you for your participation. The quorum of 5%, needed as per our constitution, has been exceeded and please find the final results as per the below:

1. Minutes SIOP 2025 Honolulu Annual Business Meeting

• Yes: 85.81%
• No: 1.94%
• Abstain: 12.26%

2. SIOP Budget 2025/2026

• Yes: 92.26%
• No: 0%
• Abstain: 7.74%

3. Do you approve of the Strategic Plan 2026 – 2030?

• Yes: 97.01%
• No: 0%
• Abstain: 2.99%

4. Do you approve to add the option for a virtual Annual Business Meeting to our constitution?

• Yes: 96.73%
• No: 1.31%
• Abstain: 1.96%

All modifications and proposals have been officially adopted by our Assembly of Delegates and the SIOP Office will implement them in the coming weeks.

The SIOP Board of Directors has met 2 days prior to the start of our conference, to present Strategic Plan for ABM voting, discuss strategic areas such as how to improve income streams and ensure sustainabiliy , congress format and make a decision on the SIOP 2028 Annual Congress Destination.
We would like to thank all our members, network, committee and WG chairs/members as well as our SIOP leadership for all their hard work surrounding our strategic review and participating in numerous listenting sessions, focus groups, conference calls and pre-reading tasks prior to our offical online voting and launch.
The SIOP Office (a special thank you goes out to Tessie Laub, Executive Director for Programmes and Strategy for all her hard work and coordinating this process) will officially launch the 2026 – 2030 SIOP Strategic Plan in January 2026.

How are locations selected?
Our Annual Congress destination selection is a complex multi-step decision making process by the SIOP Board of Directors, as the congress income plays a vital role in the financial health and sustainabilty of our society and what we can offer to our members.
Starting with the call for bids and collecting “Letters of Intent”, the SIOP Board narrows down the choices from the submitted applications to a short-list of 3 suitable destinations. Based on this pre-selection, a feasibility study for each venue is prepared based on submission of the full bidding materials.

The SIOP Board of Directors typically takes the following items into account (not in order of importance):

• The scientific community in the Congress country. We evaluate the evidence that the scientific community in the country is willing and sufficiently able to help develop a strong and balanced scientific program with local and international representation jointly with our Scientific Committe and affilicated societies (CCI, IPSO and PROS) as well as the support of the National Paediatric Haemato-Oncology Societies or groups (NaPHOS).
• Scientific exchange. Developing a good program also requires communication with experts all over the world. We look into a strong tradition of efficient scientific exchange between the host country and the global paediatric oncology community.
• Geographical rotation among continents for the Congress.
• Financial Considerations: Venue rental costs, Audio/Visual costs to support recording/hybrid meeting options, Congress venue contract flexibility and T&Cs (e.g. COVID clause), Convention Bureau and city support available, Attractiveness of the country to the pharmaceutical industry (compliance and regulations) as we depend on sponsorship support.
• Logistics and Organization: Suitability of Congress Centre (room capacities), Professionalism of the Congress Centre (modern, services offered), Accessibility/ Connectivity by plane from across the world, Availability of hotel rooms and variety of ratings, Healthy catering options, Range of social venue options, Environmental, CSR and SDG initiatives at the Congress venue, and in the host city.
• Dates the venue is available for our congress (no clash with major religious holidays, preferably Wed – Sat, months of September/October).
• Geopolitical situation in the destination (attractiveness, safety, visa requirements, political stability).
• Economic stability in the destination.
• Costs for attending the Congress: the registration fees are decided by the SIOP Board of Directors taking our multidisciplinary body of delegates into account and are ranging from physicians, to nurses, to Allied Health and other Professionals, parents and survivors and our Young SIOP members coming from HIC/UMIC/LMICs. The SIOP Board of Directors will make sure that the Congress registration fee will be reasonable, that there is a range of good hotel rates (particularly including inexpensive ones), and that travel costs can be kept as low as possible.
• Despite efforts to keep costs low, travel is expensive for young professionals, and for our Global Health Network members. It is therefore important to us, that the Local Organising Committee can guarantee the financial support for our scholarships with funding and can help us identify and communicate budget-friendly housing, restaurants and shops to support our colleagues.

You can review our detailed bidding guidelines incl. venue requirements, timeslines and process on our website here.

The final decision is never an easy one for our Board of Directors, as all 3 shortlisted destinations that attend the congress board meeting, to present their city and venue are perfectly suitable of hosting a succesful Annual Congress. Nevertheless, a decision needs to be made for one destination each year, and pros and cons need to be weighed out carefully by our leadership when they cast their anonymous vote.

We would like to thank all our bidders (Hamburg, Istanbul and Rome) for their commitment and hard work they have invested in preparing their bids. The SIOP Office will plan an in-depth feedback conference call with all bidders in the coming weeks and encourage them for further bids in the future.

Congratulations to Prof Dr Rejin Kebudi (abstained from SIOP Board Vote), Prof Dr Serap Aksoylar and Prof Dr Tezer Kutluk and their Local Organising Committee for their succesful bid this year. We very much look forward to working with them to plan and host our SIOP 2028 Annual Conference held in Istanbul (final dates tbc).

The Call for Bids for 2029 will open early December 2025 and we are looking forward to receiving bids around the globe.

More details will be emailed to all SIOP members shortly and timelines and deadlines can be found on our website here in due time.

“Bedankt” means “Thank you” in Dutch and we are proud to be part of this SIOP global paediatric oncology family.
Our Annual Congress is always a beautiful reminder of how much effort goes in childhood cancer care and how our successes are the results of a big team effort!
We are all working together to achieve that magnificent endpoint in the foreseeable future were no child should die of cancer: cure for more, care for all.