Future Meetings
Dear NASBS Member:
The Board of Directors of the North American Skull Base Society, after careful consideration, has made the decision to postpone the annual NASBS meeting, which was originally scheduled to take place March 26-29, 2009. The new dates for the meeting in New Orleans will be October 14-18, 2009. This unusual but necessary and proactive measure was taken in response to a number of uniquely challenging circumstances that had the potential to negatively impact the quality of the Society’s 20th Annual Meeting. These circumstances are as follows:
- The NASBS Board of Directors unanimously agreed in September 2008 to hire a new professional management firm, in order to better accommodate Society growth and new directions. Despite attempts to expedite the transition, the new firm, BSC Management, LLC., has not yet received all of the Society’s organizational materials, membership records, and financial documents from the previous management firm.
- The NASBS agreed to combine its annual 2008 meeting with the World Federation of Skull Base Societies. This joint meeting, held in Vancouver, B.C., only just took place in September, which is a full seven months later than our usual spring meeting, leaving a very short interval in which to prepare for the regular 2009 meeting date, scheduled to take place in March. This “short cycle”, in practical terms, has impacted the availability of many of the Society’s members and invited speakers, without whom a successful meeting would be impossible.
- The recent dramatic fluctuations on Wall Street and in the worldwide financial markets have resulted in a situation in which some of the biggest corporate sponsors for NASBS meetings are unable to commit the amount of resources that would be needed to conduct the meeting successfully.
Thus, with an unprecedented time of financial challenge for our sponsors, a short meeting cycle, and an important, and much needed, management transition in progress, the Board of Directors agreed to postpone the next annual meeting until October 14-18, 2009.
In my view and the view of the Board, the NASBS remains one of the most unique and special organizations in all of medicine. Our Society’s multidisciplinary focus and the rich cross-fertilization of knowledge it produces are unparalleled, and the resulting friendships and professional relationships invaluable. The Board of Directors, on behalf of the membership of NASBS, always strives to put forward the best possible educational assemblies. We sincerely believe that the Society’s mission will be served best by recommending this postponement, which will allow us to provide an outstanding meeting in October 2009.
In the meanwhile, members can look forward to a significant expansion of NASBS’s ongoing educational mission, just approved by the Board, including the establishment of a Core Curriculum for learning in Skull Base Surgery, and an online Library of Skull Base Materials, including lectures, demonstrational videos, abstracts, posters, and other resources. We look forward to detailing these and other developments in the very near future, and we welcome your feedback.
Sincerely Yours,
Daniel W. Nuss, MD, FACS; NASBS President, 2009
Carl Heilman, MD; NASBS Secretary
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