[Chairmen's Introductory Remarks -Close Association between Emergency Medical Care and Clinical Examinations -]

Clinical examinations are essential medical elements to determine clinical conditions and make diagnoses, and their utility has also been established in emergency medical care. Furthermore, with the introduction of the 24-hour care system by an increasing number of health care institutions in recent years, the importance of clinical examinations is expected to further increase. Although there has been an increase in laboratory technicians' awareness of emergency medical care and emergency testing in response to this trend, a standardized system has yet to be established to meet de- mands in clinical settings. The primary role of clinical examinations in emergency medical care is to help determine the clinical condi- tions of patients, and they support laboratory technicians in making judgments on the prioritization of exami- nations and their urgency, in addition to the prompt and timely provision of information on examinations re- quired by emergency physicians. In this context, we sincerely hope that this symposium will serve as a signpost to guide clinical examina- tions in the right direction for the future of emergency medical care. [Review].