It is my great pleasure to welcome you to the October issue of the AOSpine newsletter—the first since I assumed the position of AOSpine International Chairperson in July 2018.

 

It is not only that AOSpine has a new chairperson. The AO Foundation also has a new president, Robert “Bob” McGuire. For the first time in the history of the AO, we have a spine surgeon as president, which is great news for the spine surgeon community worldwide. On this occasion, I would like to congratulate Bob and wish him the best for his presidency.

 

In this issue of the newsletter, Bob McGuire shares his vision for AOSpine education and research and discusses the challenges ahead for our organization. We feature Claudio Lamartina, a spinal expert on severe spondylolisthesis and the adult deformities classifications.

 

Also, read about the latest activities of the AOSpine Knowledge Forum Deformity and the progress of the SCOLI-RISK study. As the former AOSpine Research Commission Chairperson, research lies very close to my heart. One of our key objectives is to make sure that we continue to improve the dissemination of AOSpine’s research work and share the results with spine surgeons around to globe.

 

We bring you the new special Focus Issue of the Global Spine Journal, “Spine Trauma Treatment: Recommendations of the Spine Section of the German Society for Orthopaedics and Trauma (DGOU)”.

 

You will find a collection of this summer’s top downloaded and top cited Global Spine Journal articles in this newsletter.

 

We introduce two members of our worldwide community. Carolin Melcher (Germany) and Ghazwan Hassan (Iraq) share their stories and what it means to them to be part of AOSpine.

 

It’s an exciting time for AOSpine. Based on the success of the past two Davos Courses, we have put the focus of this year’s courses entirely on Minimally Invasive Spine Surgery (MISS). There are only a few places left, make sure you register now if you would like to participate. We are currently working behind the scenes with taskforces on our MISS curriculum and hope to share the information with you soon.

 

Preparations for the Global Spine Congress in Toronto from 15–18 May 2019, are well underway. The number of abstracts submitted has once again exceeded abstract numbers from last year. In total, 1,501 abstracts were submitted—this is a 36% increase in abstracts submitted over last year. This will be a great event both academically and socially. I would like to encourage all AOSpine members to join us in in Canada next year.

 

I hope you find this issue interesting and informative. I look forward to contacting you again in the next issue later in the fall.

 

 

 

 

Yours sincerely

 

S. Rajasekaran

Chairperson,

AOSpine International

 

Claudio Lamartina

 

 

Carolin Melcher

 

Ghazwan

Abdulla Hasan

 

Global Spine Journal

 

The Top of Summer 2018

 

AOSpine-SRS Scoli-RISK-1

 

Davos Courses 2018

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