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D A I LY N E W S ASCRS ASCRS S AT U R DAY, M AY 16 , 2 0 2 0 | AS C R S V I R T U A L A N N U A L M E E T I N G DAILY NEWS HIGHLIGHTS ASCRS FOUNDATION UPDATE P. 6 FILM FESTIVAL PREVIEW P. 12 OPS WINNING IMAGES P. 28 way to help our members with the recovery process," he said. The meeting will feature more than 30 CME credits and more than 400 hours of content, and special sessions will highlight COVID-19-related content. Dr. Kim started by congrat- ulating and thanking Edward Holland, MD, chair of the ASCRS Program Committee, Steve Speares, ASCRS execu- tive director, ASCRS staff and leadership, industry sponsors, and participating faculty for by Ellen Stodola Editorial Co-Director T hough the ASCRS An- nual Meeting looks a bit different this year in its new, virtual for- mat, Terry Kim, MD, incoming president of ASCRS, said that it's a major step forward to ad- dress the current crisis, and he emphasized all the efforts that ASCRS is making to guide its members through these chal- lenging times. The Virtual Annual Meet- ing is an enormous initiative in terms of time and resources that ASCRS decided to under- take to address the COVID-19 crisis, Dr. Kim said. "We took this important step because we thought it would be the best their collaboration to make the very first Virtual Annual Meeting a reality. "We've never done a virtual meeting before, and due to having to cancel our Annual Meeting in Bos- ton fairly late, we didn't have much time to put this together. But thanks to the hard work and long hours put in by our Program Committee and ASCRS staff, we were able to produce a high-quality virtual Shifting gears to reflect on his year as president of ASCRS, Dr. Mamalis took a moment to pause and preface. "This terri- ble crisis in the whole country and what the entire profession is going through makes it diffi- cult to sit down and talk about what accomplishments have been done over the past year," Dr. Mamalis said. That said, he mentioned the rebranding of ASCRS that launched a year ago, making it clear what ASCRS does for its members and for surgeons. It's slogan—For surgeons. For you.—Dr. Mamalis said shows the commitment the society has for surgeons. "This is truly by Liz Hillman Editorial Co-Director N ick Mamalis, MD, outgoing president of ASCRS, shared his thoughts on the ASCRS Virtual Annual Meeting and his presidency as a whole. First, he gave "huge kudos" to the ASCRS staff and the Program Committee who took the full ASCRS Annual Meeting and distilled it into a 2-day virtual meeting in an extremely short period of time. "I'm very grateful that we were able to put togeth- er this meeting virtually," Dr. Mamalis said. "I am incredibly impressed at the amount of work everyone has been doing putting this together." Features he is excited for include the two-part "Turning the Lights Back On" session, which he said will be extremely timely for attendees. "The sessions on getting the practice going again, what are the steps to doing this … I think these are going to give invaluable information for people who are going through the process of restarting their practices," he said, adding later that these sessions come at a time when many states are be- ginning to loosen restrictions. He also noted the discus- sion with Scott Gottlieb, MD, former head of the FDA, who Dr. Mamalis said will likely offer valuable insights into this process. "The virtual meeting will also have the usual tremendous education that goes on at the ASCRS Annual Meeting," Dr. Mamalis said, mentioning that it even has a virtual exhibit hall for attendees to interact with industry representatives. continued on page 4 continued on page 3 Thoughts from outgoing ASCRS President Nick Mamalis, MD Incoming ASCRS President Terry Kim, MD, speaks about current situation and what ASCRS is doing to address this Saturday, May 16, 2020 ASCRS Virtual Annual Meeting @EyeWorldMag EyeWorld Magazine

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