This congress was held as a Satellite Symposium of the 15th International Diabetes Federation (IDF) Congress in Kobe, held on November 6-11, 1994. Over the last decade research on diabetic neuropathy has focussed our attention on new approaches to its pathogenesis and treatment. A number of hypotheses concerned with etiology have been proposed, which may, for convenience, be grouped under the headings "metabolic", "vascular", "trophic" and "other". It is well known that much research based on these hypotheses have contributed to the resulting therapeutically valuable developments. However, despite the progress in these aspects, the precise mechanisms still remain one of the most important unsolved problems in biochemical, physiological and/or pathological research. Researchers and clinicians from all over the world gathered together to discuss these varied topics.
