Message from the President

Message from the President

I hope this message finds you all in good health. Thank you for the support and cooperation you continue to give the Society.

A new Board of Directors took office at the General Assembly of November 12, 2025, and I was appointed President, succeeding Professor Tomihiro Imai. The Society dates from 1971, when the Japanese EEG Society and the Japanese EMG Society merged to form the Japanese Society of Electroencephalography and Electromyography. It took its present name, the Japanese Society of Clinical Neurophysiology, in 2000. Taking the helm of a society with more than half a century of history is a serious responsibility, and I am well aware of how much I still have to learn. I will give the role everything I have, and I ask for your guidance and support.

What sets this Society apart is that it is an interdisciplinary platform for the study of clinical neurophysiology in humans. Our members come from neurology, neurosurgery, psychiatry, orthopedic surgery and rehabilitation medicine. They also include the clinical physiology technologists who perform neurophysiological studies day in and day out, and researchers in the field. Clinical neurophysiology covers remarkable ground. It reaches from the central nervous system to the spinal cord, peripheral nerves and muscle, and its methods run from electrophysiology and neuroimaging to invasive and non-invasive brain stimulation. Neuromodulation is now drawing attention as a third therapeutic option alongside medical and surgical treatment. Here too the Society is advancing translational research and novel therapies, with close attention to ethics and to the strength of the evidence. Our mission, as I see it, is to raise the standard of clinical neurophysiological practice in every clinical specialty, and to strengthen the two wheels that carry the field forward: education and research.

In practice and education, the Society certifies both physicians and technologists in three core areas: electroencephalography, electromyography and nerve conduction studies, and intraoperative neurophysiological monitoring. We will invest in all three, so that care and education of the same high standard are available everywhere in Japan.

Our educational activities widened considerably under Professor Imai. Building on that foundation, this Board will strengthen both the training of young physicians and technologists and the lifelong learning of established members. Working with our Directors and Councilors, we will expand what we offer in person and online alike. Thanks to the Educational Content Committee, the e-learning library available to members continues to grow. The JSCN educational courses and hands-on workshops in the three core areas have now run for more than a decade, and have grown steadily better in the process. I hope members will make these a place to keep learning throughout their careers, whether they are taking their first steps in clinical neurophysiology or are already well established in it.

In research, a quarter of the twenty-first century, the century of the brain, has already passed, and neuroscience in human subjects matters more than ever. We will make the most of what this Society does uniquely well: study human clinical neurophysiology across disciplinary lines. By strengthening our ties with related societies, we will build an environment in which the Society and its members can speak to the world on both diagnosis and treatment.

Clinical neurophysiology is a field where “Best Care by Best Research” can truly be practiced. The Society will do more to bring its research to an international audience, and will work to become a place where younger members grow as researchers as well as clinicians.

I am one of many who had the privilege of learning from the late Professor Jun Kimura and the late Professor Hiroshi Shibasaki, each of whom served as President of the International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology (IFCN). In that spirit, I will work with our members to make the Society more international in both education and research. This has two sides that must move together. One is internationalization from within: practicing world-class care and research. The other looks outward: teaching in English at home and abroad, and communicating our findings internationally. Our generation’s task is to build further on the foundations our predecessors laid.

Enough formality. What I really want to say is simpler. Clinical Neurophysiology is fascinating! It lets us bring the newest diagnostic and therapeutic technology straight to the patients in front of us today, and to do the research that will help the patients of tomorrow. To young physicians, allied health professionals and technologists: if any of this interests you, even a little, come to our Annual Meeting or to a JSCN educational course or hands-on workshop. See for yourself what the field is really about.

I ask you once again for your understanding and your generous support as we work together for the future of the Japanese Society of Clinical Neurophysiology.

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