With the annual scientific meeting of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons just concluded in New Orleans, neurosurgeons, industry and the public have once again had the opportunity to participate in the premier educational and social event of the AANS calendar.
 Thomas A. Marshall |
One measure of this association’s growth can be taken by comparing the issues leadership and membership addressed during this year’s meeting with those that were at the forefront of the 2000 AANS Annual Meeting in San Francisco.
Five years ago, the educational offerings were selected to give members insight into advancing technologies, the latest skills in innovative surgical techniques, and the tools to deal with increasing socioeconomic pressures and demands on the management of their practices. But in 2000, the critical leadership issues confronting the AANS focused on financial instability and uncertainty, a completely new — and unproven — management team, unprecedented turnover of the professional staff, and alarming polarities dividing the allied groups within the house of neurosurgery.
Full Focus on Member Needs in Evidence
This year in New Orleans, the educational selections continued expanding their reputation for superior faculty and diverse topics with programs such as the latest innovations in minimally invasive surgery, developing medical liability action plans, and discussions of the most current practical aspects of movement disorder treatments, to name but a few. The leadership issues, however, were significantly different than they were five years ago; this year, they were indicative of a stable organization, secure in
its leadership and management foundations, and proactively addressing issues affecting the physicians and specialty it represents, rather than dealing with fractiousness and uncertainty.
Rather than implementing financial scenarios to immediately reduce the scope of it services, New Orleans agendas centered on proposals to expand AANS services to address the needs of its members, needs that were identified by the membership itself rather than assumed by staff and leaders. For the third consecutive year, committees were driven by a comprehensive strategic plan, eliminating duplicate and nonproductive effort and assuring focus in the areas the members themselves identified as meaningful.
The AANS consistently advocates for its members on issues ranging from tort reform to workforce issues, outcomes measurement to relationships with international colleagues, and partnership with industry to partnership with collegial organizations. Correspondingly, the 2005 AANS Annual Meeting was a portrait of an association in full flight with its responsibilities to the science, education, and leadership of neurosurgery.
Members and Staff Lose a Genuine Colleague: Ken Nolan, IS Director, Will Be Missed
Sadly, the AANS staff undertook this year’s task of mounting yet another successful annual meeting knowing they had lost a valuable professional colleague. Two days before staff began arriving in New Orleans, AANS Information Systems Director Ken Nolan passed away unexpectedly. Ken was a part of the AANS management team since July 2000.
The monumental growth of technologically driven membership services was realized under Ken’s direction. Online tracking of continuing medical education credit for members, establishing and implementing the dedicated AANS.org Web site, establishing the journal Neurosurgical Focus online, the ongoing yeoman’s work of improving the AANS technological security systems and comprehensive membership database, implementing the online voting technologies, executing the technological upgrade of the AANS/CNS Washington office computer systems and redesigning the Web site for the American Board of Neurological Surgery were but a small sampling of the innovations the AANS membership benefited from under Ken’s professional expertise.
The AANS membership lost a loyal employee who provided many innovative services. But the AANS staff lost a good-natured, dedicated colleague who was as ready with a laugh as he was with an idea. That the AANS professional staff could undertake the arduous task of putting on the premier educational event in neurosurgery with its attendant expectations of flawless execution, without the opportunity at the time to pay tribute to their colleague, spoke more of their performance at this year’s meeting than any words could describe.
The membership is served exceptionally well by the AANS professional staff, and the organization’s exceptional growth realized by the dynamic partnership between staff, leadership and membership was never more apparent than it was at the 2005 AANS Annual Meeting in New Orleans.
Thomas A. Marshall is the AANS executive director.