North American Spine Society President Daniel Resnick, MD, wrote a column about the society's goals and objectives for 2018, published in SpineLine.
Dr. Resnick defined his job simply: "to serve the mission of NASS." He wrote that it's nice to remind himself and all NASS members of the organization's ultimate mission and ensure that mission is the foundation of strategic and operational planning.
He referenced several NASS bylaws, highlighting how the organization continues to meet its mission.
1. Enhance the quality of scientific knowledge in the spinal disorder field. Dr. Resnick pointed to the society's research council, which outputs clinical practice guidelines, appropriate use criteria and more. He said NASS anticipates moving research funding from the operations budget to the NASS Foundation within the next year. "Research funding is simply too important to be dependent on the vicissitudes of the operational budget," he wrote.
NASS also plans to unveil its registry product, which has been in the works for the last eight years, before September. "The design of the registry is flexible, the costs are low and the intent is to capture information regarding the vast majority of patients with spinal disorders who do not fit into neat diagnostic boxes or participate in randomized clinical trials," Dr. Resnick wrote.
2. Provide platform for exchange of ideas and dissemination of scientific facts about the spine. At this year's annual meeting, NASS is focused on strengthening relationships with colleagues globally, "specifically recognizing the similarities and differences in training background, clinical experience and cultural expectations."
Additionally, the organization's health policy council and advocacy council are working to add approximately 25 new documents to its portfolio of scientific facts about spine and spine care in the next year.
3. Offer instruction, scientific meetings and professional publications regarding surgical, nonoperative and diagnostic spine care. NASS appointed Christopher Bono, MD, the next editor-in-chief of The Spine Journal. "Chris has been charged with expanding the scale and scope of TSJ through a number of potential international outreach efforts, supporting development of an open access journal and the reorganization and expansion of the editorial compliment," wrote Dr. Resnick.