First of all I would like to express my recognition to all IAOMS members engaged in our educational projects for their work and support. It is my pleasure as the Chairman of the IAOMS Education Committee to inform you of the key points of our activity after the last meeting of the IAOMS Education Committee and Executive Committee which were held in May 2009 in Shanghai.
Education Committee Listing
I had the honor to be confirmed by the IAOMS President Larry Nissen as the chairman of the Committee for the new period 2010-2011. The updated committee members listing is attached. Due to their excellent work, all members of the previous committee have been confirmed with the exception of Luis Quevedo who due to his commitment to the next ICOMS to be held in Chile, cannot continue as the Latin American representative to the Committee. Eduardo Rey has taken over this position on behalf of ALACIBU. We would like to sincerely thank Luis for the excellent work he has done for the Education Committee. He was a key person in the development of the educational programmes in Latin America held in Peru and currently in Paraguay. We will continue to count on his advice and support and wish him all the best in his new role in the IAOMS as the Chairman of the ICOMS 2011.
Regional Educational Projects
Our gratitude goes to John Williams, past President of the Foundation, who played a critical role in the development of the African Project. We are happy with the support that Nabil Samman, current Foundation President, has expressed to the progress of our International programs.
East Africa
This program in collaboration with the East African Association is progressing smoothly. As you know, the first course of this programme was held in the University of Nairobi (Kenya) in September 2007. Six modules have been held until now. Venues have been Nairobi and Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania), with the local director in Nairobi being Prof Mark Chindia, who is the African Representative to the Education Committee, and Secretary General Dr F Butt; while the local director in Dar is Dr Elison Simon. The last two modules were held again in Nairobi, Kenya, once the political situation was better in this country. I had the opportunity to travel to Africa again and to participate in both the 5th and 6th modules of this programme. The 5th course took place between 28th September and 2nd October, 2009. About 30 participants from different east African countries (Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Bostwana, and Rwanda) attended the course in a highly interactive way. The topic was Oral and Maxillofacial Trauma and our guest speakers were David McPherson and Roger Webb (UK), who presented an excellent course. As a special note, a hands-on workshop on Advanced Trauma Life Support was included. The 6th Course was held between 1-5 March, 2010 on Head and Neck Tumors. This topic will be developed during two courses, with benign tumors the topic for the first course. The guest speakers were Thjis Merkx and Jan De Vischer (Nl), who did a great job. During my visits to Nairobi, I had the opportunity to organize meetings with the representatives from the Universities of Nairobi and Dar es Salam as well as with the President of the African Association, Prof Simon Guthua. All of them expressed their gratitude for the IAOMS support. We think that this educational project has been very important in encouraging our colleagues in East Africa to develop a common training project. Moreover, a movement to the harmonization of surgical specialties in the region probably will lead to the establishment of a 5-year OMFS Training being included the specialty in a common trunk with other surgical specialties in the framework of the College of Surgeons of East Africa. An acknowledgment letter was sent by Prof Chindia after the last course.
The next course of the East African Program is planned to be held in Nairobi (Kenya) in September 2010. The topic will be Head and Neck Malignant Tumors. Further planning of future activities once the first project is completed is under study.
Asia
The Indonesian program ran for 2 years, ending in August 2008. We had the opportunity to meet our Malaysian colleagues in Shanghai and to review the basic guidelines for a new series of educational courses there. I would like to express our gratitude to our Past President and current Foundation Chair, Nabil Samman, for his incredible work in Asia, which led to the development of this new program in Malaysia. This project includes 4 modules to be developed between 2009 and 2010. The first course took place at the University of Kuala Lumpur between 20th and 23th August 2009. Guest speakers on the topic “Head and Neck Tumours and Reconstruction” were Andrew Brown and Paul Norris (UK). According to Nabil´s report, about 100 participants mostly from Malaysia but also from Indonesia and Myanmar attended. I would like to express our recognition to the speakers and the local organizing team under the leadership of Dr. Zainal Ariff bin Abdul Rhaman, Second course of this program was recently held in the University of Malaya (22-25 April 2010). The topic was Trauma and the lecturers were Roger Zwahlen of Hong Kong University and Marco Kesting (Germany).
Latin America
As you know, the second IAOMS Latin American program is going on in Encarnacion (Paraguay) between 2009-2010 in collaboration with the Paraguayan Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery and the University of Asuncion. After the last Executive Committee meeting in Shanghai, three new courses of this program have been held. The second Course took place between July 29th and August 1st 2009. About 250 attendants enjoyed the lectures on Dento-alveolar and Maxillo-facial trauma presented by Laura Pacheco (Mexico) and Antonio Lombardi (Argentina). The third course was held between 26-28 November 2009. The topics were Oral Pathology and Dento-alveolar surgery and the speakers were Leopoldo Meneses (Peru) and Adriana Basili (Chile). 248 people registered although final attendance were 154 persons, 31 of them coming from Argentina. The fourth module took place recently (22-24 April). Preliminary reports inform of a successful course, attended by about 200 people. Topics were Pre-implant and pre-prosthetic surgery and Implant Surgery. Speakers were Edela Puricelli (Brazil) and Antonio Lopez-Davis (Spain). The next course of this program will be held in August. I would like to express my gratitude to the local authorities, the AAOMS and the Spanish Association for their financial support to this program, which is given as a donation to the IAOMS Foundation. Special thanks go to Carlos Mallorquin, President of the Paraguayan Association, for his excellent work on the ground.
Since the second Latin American Program will end in October 2010, we are currently discussing with ALACIBU, presided by Edwin Valencia, the possibility of organizing new IAOMS courses in the future. A proposal in Central America (El Salvador) is under evaluation.
IAOMS Fellowships
We had the pleasure to cooperate in evaluating the guidelines ruling on this new IAOMS project before launching it. We wish the best success to the fellowships program and remain at disposal of the responsible persons of the Fellowships for any advice regarding the educational aspects.
E-Learning
I am also happy to inform on the progress of the project on E-learning which is being developed in deep cooperation with Alexis Olsson. As the Chairman of the Education Committee we are happy to participate in this exciting project. Our responsibility is mainly focused on providing educational material and supervision on the scientific contents and developments as well to cooperate in building the faculty for the different teaching areas. A draft committee covering the different areas of OMFS has been proposed to the Board of Directors. As a pilot test, some lectures on Infection taken from the course held in Paraguay have been recorded as “Weblectures” and will be offered to a group of select Latin American trainees. I thank Alexis for his enthusiastic work in this project and Satheesh Prabhu for his collaboration in the production.
Trainee meeting at the ICOMS, Shanghai 2009
The Education Committee was very happy with the second Trainee Meeting held during the ICOMS in Shanghai. We thank the Conference´s organizing committee and the Advanced Cranio-Maxillofacial Forum (ACMF, an Stryker development) for supporting the organization of this session. The topic was “Orthognathic Surgery in the 21st Century.” It was a new success, which has become a part of the life of the Association. For this reason we would like to propose to organize a new Trainees Meeting during the ICOMS to be held in Santiago. Some organizational aspects should be changed taking in account previous experiences.
Finally, I would like to thank once again all colleagues engaged in the organization of these educational projects worldwide, especially to my colleagues in the Education Committee and the Executive Committee. Without your collaboration nothing would have been possible.
Respectfully submitted