From the Executive Director

Military Medicine, Spring 2006 by Anderson, George K

Spring is here, and the pace of AMSUS activities is brisk as we accomplish the tasks necessary to plan our Annual Meeting, publish Military Medicine, build membership, and provide member services. We are making progress in each of these areas of action.

Planning for the San Antonio conference is going very well. The Veterans Health Administration will host the 2006 meeting, and Doctor Jon Rerun's hand is on the helm. The meeting planning committee, chaired by Doctor Bill Duncan, has been hard at work since January. The theme is "Health 2015: Actionable Strategies for Caring for our Warriors, Veterans, and Population." Enthusiasm is building as each step is taken toward presenting what is sure to be another great meeting.

Linda Hines, our Convention Manager, and I visited San Antonio in March to ensure that the desired local arrangements for the convention were taking shape properly. Because AMSUS has held many Annual Meetings in San Antonio since the first one in 1972, our organization is known well by the Convention Center and hotel staffs. I am very impressed by the enthusiastic support and cooperative spirit of those working with us in San Antonio.

Our search for a new journal editor is underway. The position has been advertised in the February and March issues of Military Medicine. We have had a number of professionals express serious interest in the position, but there is still time for others to submit applications. Please help to get the word out to those whom you believe would serve us well as editor.

These are exciting times for those involved with our journal. We are continuing our venture into the era of electronic journalism and are now evaluating software products that will allow us to manage the editorial processes more efficiently. The new editor will help sustain the excellent content of the journal, guide the evolution of the way in which it is managed, and sharpen its focus to meet the emerging interests of its readers.

I included a comment in my column in the last AMSUS Newsletter about my long tenure as a member of the Association. I have been impressed with the value of membership from the perspective of an individual military professional for more than thirty years. However, I had not been involved in the activities of our corporate members until recently. I have gained an expanded view of this part of AMSUS.

The AMSUS Sustaining Members meet several times a year in addition to the annual conference. More than one hundred representatives of our corporate members attended their February meeting in Washington DC. The Sustaining Members group is well, and the intent is to grow the group and to extend the scope of interest to a broader spectrum of types of companies. Six new Sustaining Member companies were recognized at the meeting.

The short version of the story about my first impressions is that I am pleased with the foundation on which AMSUS is built. As I communicate with medical and health service leaders, the comments coming to me always indicate that AMSUS, its meetings, and its journal are well respected. However, there is much work to do, especially as we seek to improve the value proposition for our members. Please let us know if you have ideas to offer. The lines of communication are open.

GEORGE K. ANDERSON, MD, MPH

Maj Gen, USAF, MC (Ret)