Over the past year, in response to a challenge from ASA Immediate Past President James E. Cottrell, M.D., a task force has considered ways to improve the educational programs offered during the ASA Annual Meeting. After extensive deliberations and evaluation of the current program offerings, the task force has recommended, and the Section on Annual Meeting approved, the creation of educational tracks as part of the Annual Meeting format. The tracks will be designed to focus educational activities around a major clinical area and to provide the attendees with a concentrated educational program within a two-day timeframe.

In addition to the tracks, the program will continue to include topics of general interest in multiple formats, including Refresher Courses, panels, problem-based learning discussions, scientific papers and workshops. While the tracks will concentrate the educational experience within the two designated days, topics related to the track will be provided at other times during the Annual Meeting to allow those who cannot attend the meeting during the two-day track to learn about parallel topics of interest.

Over the next two years, the Annual Meeting will incorporate multiple educational tracks into the program, providing an opportunity for attendees to concentrate their educational experience on selected subspecialty areas. The subspecialty tracks and material of general interest will be presented simultaneously, and the participants will be able to select any of a number of sessions to attend based on their interest, educational needs and the format of the presentation. The tracks will highlight aspects of subspecialty care of interest to a broad audience. The new format will foster the integration of subspecialty anesthesiologists with the needs of the membership as a whole. The subspecialty societies will continue to have their own meetings, which usually take place on the Friday before the ASA Annual Meeting, and will allow better coordination of the educational programs offered by subspecialty societies and ASA.

The 2004 Annual Meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada, will be the first to include selected educational tracks. The program at this year’s meeting will introduce two educational tracks. The critical care medicine (CCM) track will take place on Saturday and Sunday, and the obstetrical anesthesiology track will be held on Monday and Tuesday.

A task force has organized and developed the CCM content of the program. I have the privilege of chairing this task force whose members include Todd Dorman, M.D., Andrew Gettinger, M.D., Gerald A. Maccioli, M.D., and Michael F. O’Connor, M.D. The CCM track offers a unique opportunity for every anesthesiologist to obtain broad-based training in the care of critically ill patients and to provide a better understanding of ways to integrate clinical and administrative aspects of CCM into an anesthesiology practice.

The CCM track will provide a number of different and exciting educational formats in addition to the traditional refresher course and panels. Breakfast panels will be held on both Saturday and Sunday, including a session on the management of the adult patient with congenital heart disease and CNS resuscitation. Attendees can select a critical care-oriented Refresher Course Lecture during each session on Saturday and Sunday. Simultaneous sessions will include panels on postresuscitation care, new therapeutics, obstacles to optimal clinical management and incorporating critical care into an anesthesia practice.

In addition to the traditional educational programs, the CCM track will introduce some new formats. Controversies in clinical management will offer lively debates on topics of interest to every anesthesiologist and will include expert panelists who will use evidence-based approaches to justify their positions on each topic. Some of the “point-counterpoint” topics to be included in the track include “Colloid vs. Crystalloid: Is the Controversy Dead?”, “Glycemic Control: Does It Matter?” and “Transfusion Therapy: Triggers and Targets.” The Scientific Paper discussions also will include a new format and will be organized around three areas: outcomes/safety, sepsis/inflammation and challenges in patient management. A group of panelists will discuss information relevant to each topic and serve as moderators and discussants for each scientific paper session. Finally, the Anesthesiology Journal Symposium for 2004 will be part of the CCM track.

The creation of educational tracks represents a major change for the ASA Annual Meeting and an opportunity to improve the educational value of the meeting to all anesthesiologists. Each of you will find something of interest in the CCM track, and the new educational formats will provide an opportunity for each attendee to participate more actively in the Annual Meeting.

Neal H. Cohen, M.D., is Vice-Dean, School of Medicine, Professor of Anesthesia and Medicine and President of the University of California-San Francisco Medical Group, San Francisco, California.