President's Message

Dear Colleague,

It is time to renew your membership with the Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society (CAS) for 2010. Your support of the CAS through your membership is vital to its achievement of its goals.

Your CAS membership is also an investment in your professional career!

I am glad to report that our Annual Meeting continues to grow in popularity and size. Such success is only possible with strong scientific CPD accredited content and a tremendous amount of work by the Annual Meeting Committee and CAS office staff. CAS members enjoy a discount of over $300 on the cost for the Annual Meeting (for full-meeting registration), taking place in Montreal, June 25 to 29, 2010.

The Canadian Journal of Anesthesia (CJA) offers improved online availability (see the “CJA” link of the members section on the CAS website) and publishes 12 issues per year both online and in print. Thanks to the dedicated Editorial Board and a sound editorial policy under the lead of Dr Donald Miller, Editor-in-Chief, the CJA’s circulation and impact factor (mean journal citation frequency) continue to rise. The 2008 impact factor of 2.051 places the CJA in tenth position of the twenty-two indexed anesthesiology journals.

Ongoing CAS surveying determined that the membership overwhelmingly supports the Guidelines to the Practice of Anesthesia. Until now published as a supplement to the Journal, the decision was made to publish the next edition of the Guidelines in the Journal itself beginning January 2010.

Our commitment to continuing professional development (CPD) requires the CAS to maintain its accreditor status with the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. CAS offers additional discounts to members on its already comparatively low fees for accreditation of group learning activities. When you and your fellow members (up to half of the planners can be non-members) apply for CPD accreditation of your group learning activity, your accreditation fee is reduced in half. See the “education” link on the members section of the CAS website for more information.

Our online CPD/CME, a popular source of Maintenance of Certification credits, further increases the value of your CAS membership. It can be accessed at no charge by our members.

Your CAS Board meets on your behalf three times per year to discuss all pertinent Society matters. Based on the strategic plan, our primary goal is advocacy – remaining a driving force to nationally advance the interests of anesthesiologists and ensure they are recognized as professionals in acute and chronic pain management.

In keeping with the CAS objective, the Board is currently moving forward with a national advocacy campaign, starting with a “stop smoking for safer surgery” initiative that will promote recognition of anesthesiologists as physicians first with further specialized training who are not only crucial and essential members of the operating room team but also responsible for planning and managing patient’s individual needs before and after surgery.

We also represent the interests of our members at the Canadian Medical Association, the Royal College, the Canadian Standards Association, Wait Time Alliance and the World Federation of Societies of Anesthesiologists.

CAS committees also work on your behalf. The committee structure can be found on the CAS website. We invite you to contribute your time, interest, and energies to the CAS through our committees.

The Canadian Anesthesia Research Foundation (CARF) and the Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society International Education Foundation (CAS IEF) continue their work on behalf of Canadian anesthesiologists. I encourage you to include donations to both foundations with your membership payment. Our successes in research and education distinguish us as an organization.

I hope you will agree with me that by continuing your membership you will benefit as a member and that our patients will benefit from continued improvements in the quality and safety of anesthesia services.

Please feel free to contact me at president@cas.ca or the CAS office, at membership@cas.ca if you have any questions.

Looking forward to continued involvement with the CAS.

Pierre Fiset, MD FRCPC

Please click here to renew.