Message from the President ...
It was the best of times, it was the worst
of times, ... it was the season of light, it
was the season of darkness, it was the
spring of hope, it was the winter of
despair, we had everything before us, we
had nothing before us...Charles Dickens
If you read my President's Message in the May issue of Focus, you have probably figured out that I like Charles Dickens. I read a lot of his work when I was in school and this quote was always my favorite. The first time I read it, I thought it applied to college. The next time I read it, I thought it applied to medical school. The next time I read it, I thought it applied to residency..... then fellowship.... then working at NIH....(then marriage).... and so on. Maybe it just seems to relate perfectly to my perception of challenging times. Thus, of course it applies to my Presidency of this relatively small but growing organization. It seems like yesterday, but it was actually almost 12 years ago, when Carlos Bedrossian, invited me to come to a business meeting of the PSC. Little did I know he planned on nominating me for the Executive Board and that there would be an open vote at the meeting that day! There I was, sitting in this conference room feeling incredibly anonymous and insignificant, surrounded by many famous cytopathologists (Steve Silverberg, Lester Layfield, Michael Cohen, Jan Silverman, Kim Geisinger, etc.), none of whom I knew at the time. Boy, was I embarrassed! Imagine my surprise when I won! Little did I know what was in store. We were a fledgling society at the time - a real Mom (Ursula) and Pop (Carlos) shop and those of us that got involved were expected to work BIG TIME. No task was too great (editing newsletters) or too small (licking envelopes), and boy was it fun. Coming from NIH where I was used to menial tasks such as vacuuming, taking out the trash, and dusting my office (heck - I even painted my office), it seemed a natural progression. Carlos was a wonderful mentor to so many of us who were starting out who did not have the coattails of a famous mentor to hang on to. I will always be grateful to him for that.
When I think back on the early days of my career, many of my absolutely happiest memories have to do with PSC and our annual meetings at USCAP. The scientific sessions and of course the receptions where you actually got to see the people you were speaking with on the phone all year (there was no email back in the days of the dinousaurs...) and events I looked forward to all year ("... what am I going to wear..." ??). Many of the plans for the NCI Breast Conference that I helped organize in 1996 were made at the PSC reception that year in the Washington Hilton. This year the seedlings for the NCI Thyroid FNA State of the Science Conference (October 22 and 23, 2007) were planted at the PSC annual meeting. Add a little wine to a cytological mind and you don't know what will happen next...
The "season of darkness" - well, we all know what that was - last year when we almost lost our spot at USCAP due to low attendance and bad reviews at our evening sessions. It was heart wrenching, to say the least. We were working really hard trying to put together great sessions but we were not getting good reviews. Luckily, this downward spiral reversed itself at the annual meeting last year and we had a great meeting, bringing us to the "spring of hope" - March 2007. Lester and his magicians have once again put together a fabulously cutting edge scientific session which we hope you will ATTEND and RATE HIGHLY because we are not completely out of the woods yet. This issue of FOCUS has detailed information about it on page 4. In addition to our evening session we have an interesting afternoon session as well - Dr. John Abele from Outpatient Pathology Associates of Sacramento, California, is going to speak to us about how his group of cytopathologists performs ultrasound localization for FNAs. I was fortunate to spend a few days with Dr. Abele in his clinic and saw first hand how useful and informative cytologist performed ultrasound can be when doing FNAs. You can actually see when you are in the lesion as well as the characteristics of the lesion (solid, cystic, etc) , which is particularly useful for thyroid aspirates of palpable and non-palpable lesions. So, while ultrasound technology has been around for a while, its use by cytologists themselves can be considered pretty much "cutting edge". What I really like about it is that it is something I can see, unlike most of what is cutting edge in pathology on the molecular level. There is something incredibly cool about seeing a nodule on ultrasound and actually watching your needle sample it on the screen in front of you. It is great! I highly recommend coming to hear John who is an absolute master.
In other society news we may have a semi-permanent spot for a session at the European Congress of Cytology. Through Philippe Viehl we were invited to the meeting in Venice this year. Martha Pitman and Carlos Bedrossian brought down the house, which is highly encouraging for our future participation.... The PSC textbook series by Oxford University Press is moving along and coming to fruition. The series will be based on small tissue pathology, ie not just cytology but biopsy pathology also. It is a unique concept which we think (and hope) should be very successful.... Our website, which got a fabulous face lift a few years ago by Rana Hoda and our webmaster, continues to get many hits looking at our standards of practice guidelines and case of the month (which is due for some back updating). The thyroid guidelines are there in Power Point format now and will be in outline form by January. Zubair Baloch is putting together a committee to review urinary cytology guidelines which will be published on our website as soon as they are completed. Rana and I are working with our webmaster to add a " Cytologic Images" section to the PSC website that is organized by diagnosis. For this section our members can send in as well as view images and pull images off for teaching or lecturing. The success of this will depend upon our members sharing their photos, but if they do we will all definitely benefit greatly. The website for the NCI Thyroid FNA State of the Science Conference will go live on May 1, 2007 with the initial review and discussion points. It will be fully interactive (much like the last Bethesda System website was) and will remain permanent for educational purposes. An online atlas will be done as well after the conference. These should be fabulous educational tools. I will send out information via the PSC and ASC list serves.
Well, in these 11 years my involvement has come full circle to the point where in March I will be passing the Presidency baton to Stephen Raab. I would like to formally thank Ursula Bedrossian, Carlos Bedrossian, Kim Geisinger, Claire Michael, Steve Raab, Lester Layfield, Martha Pitman, Eric Suba, Zubair Baloch, David Chhieng, Dan Kurtycz, Ann Moriarty and Aylin Simsir for their never ending support and help to me and dedication to excellence and this society. I truly hope that many more of you will continue to become involved in this society - we are small, but we are dedicated to education and "we have everything before us".
My very best wishes to you all,
Andrea
