Introduction
Respiratory diseases place considerable burden on society and are among the leading causes of mortality worldwide. Within the European Union, these diseases account for 17% of male and 10% of female deaths [1]. In monetary terms, the European Lung Foundation (ELF)/European Respiratory Society (ERS) estimates economic burden at approximately €102 billion or €118 per capita [2]. It is concluded that failure to diagnose, treat or manage respiratory diseases, results not only in higher treatment costs, but also impacts upon quality of life and well-being for the patient. Subspecialty training and career development of the young respiratory specialist has been identified as a fundamental aspect of delivering quality care and strengthening respiratory medicine. Moreover, as adult respiratory specialists increasingly seek opportunities abroad, the harmonisation of standards to train specialists in respiratory medicine across Europe becomes crucial.
Working towards consistent criteria for respiratory medicine, ERS, since 1990, continues to produce consensus statements and clinical practice guidelines on issues related to this field of medicine. In 2005, as part of the mission to advance the practice of the specialty, the HERMES (Harmonised Education in Respiratory Medicine for European Specialists) project was born to provide a shared framework for the training and certification of adult respiratory specialists across countries. Justification for the project grew from results of a number of surveys carried out by ERS [3] confirming the stark differences of medical educational programmes and lack of homogeneity of syllabus, curriculum and exit criteria for training of adult respiratory specialists.
Within the HERMES model, a process of establishing consensus standards for training largely follows four key phases (fig. 1) with the goal of developing collective documentation and activities. To date, three of the phases have been published and delivered by the HERMES Task Force, and are available in …
