Paediatric Virology: A new paediatric subspecialty? A proposal at the Workshop on Paediatric Virology, Athens, October 10, 2015

Paediatric subspecialty education involves the state-of-the-art training and practice on specific scientific fields of Paediatrics requiring clinical expertising and academic excellence (1). The medical school settings and the tertiary hospitals have been specified as the main employment sites of paediatric subspecialists, where their major professional activities include direct paediatric patient care, teaching, as well as management duties. A combination of enhanced paediatric demands and expectations have contributed to the need for standardised and comprehensive training programmes, focusing on the suitable education of paediatric subspecialty trainees. The paediatric infectious diseases subspeciality is one of the first subspecialities, which has been included in the paediatric training programmes in several countries, worldwide (2). To date, paediatric infectious diseases professionals have achieved a distinct role within the scientific field of Paediatrics and their contribution to tertiary paediatric care is considered invaluable (3,4). However, over the past decade, scientific advances on the field of Clinical Virology and Molecular Medicine have led to changes in current clinical practice as regards the management and treatment of neonates and children with viral infections. New viral infections are constantly emerging, requiring new prevention strategies and therapeutic protocols. Paediatric transplant infectious diseases are another challenge within paediatric infectious diseases, reflecting the complexity of this patient population (5). Moreover, new clinical practice guidelines for the vaccination of immunocompromised children have been established and thus regular reviewing of this matter is required (6). Additional scientific fields, including Evidence-based Medicine, Clinical Governance and Pharmacokinetic/Pharmacodynamics (7) have also a significant supportive input. These advances have highlighted the role of Paediatric Virology as a new paediatric subspeciality candidate, a new unique challenging scientific area, where paediatric professionals of the 21st century require an advanced state-of-the-art education. The new challenges related to paediatric viral infections include emerging infections, opportunistic infections in immunocompromised patients, antimicrobial resistance and the development of new diagnostic tests, vaccines and antiviral agents, ensuring the future of this paediatric subspecialty. The word 'Paediatric', referring to the branch of Medicine that deals with the medical care of children, derives from two ancient Greek words: 'παῖς' (pais), which in modern Greek has changed to 'παιδί' (paidi), meaning the 'child' and 'ἰατρός' (iatros), meaning 'the doctor' or 'the healer', from the verb 'ἰάομαι/ἰῶμαι' (iaome/iome), meaning 'healing'. On the other hand, the word 'Virology', the study of viruses, comes from the Latin word 'virus', meaning 'the poison', which has been in common use in the English language …