It is traditional for the president of the United States - Canadian Academy of Pathology (USCAP) to welcome members and non-members alike to our Annual Meeting, and so I now take that opportunity. This city is not just another city, but as the U.S. capitol it is never very far from our conscious state. It is one of the world class cities with a history that serves as a microcosm and a looking glass into some of the greatest and most unfortunate events in our distant and not so distant past. Over the past 46 years, we have met in Washington, D.C. a total of five times in 1957, 1967, 1973, 1988 and most recently in 1996.

Virtually in any direction that one turns in the metamorphical circle that encompasses the Academy from total membership, meeting attendance, abstract submissions, manuscripts submitted to our journals, Laboratory Investigation and Modern Pathology, website activity and Diagnostic Pathology, Summer 2002, we are performing at a level that the Dow-Jones index could only hope for. For instance, we presently have 8,709 total members in all categories including 1,400 Junior Members. In June 1999, there were approximately 500 Junior Members. Just in the last two years almost 400 Junior Members have transferred into the Regular Member category. It should be pointed out that all of this growth activity has taken place with overhead expenses that any other professional society could only wish for. The total value that the Academy provides to us as members is unsurpassed by any professional society in my estimation. All of this is the result of devoted committees of the Academy and the support provided by the staff of the Augusta office under the able and energetic efforts and leadership of Fred Silva, M.D. These individuals are absolutely devoted to the Academy and are responsible for our operational existence on a daily basis. We should never miss an opportunity to recognize these individuals including Jim Crimmins, Jo Ann Johnson, Carolyn Lane, Linda Haygood, and the others in the office and express our gratitude for their ceaseless efforts in our behalf.

Our entry into the electronic universe not surprisingly has brought us into an expanding realm. The web site (www.uscap.org) is the depot for incoming and outgoing informational and educational activity. There are at present about 200,000 "hits" on the site every month. Many of the other divisions of the International Academy of Pathology are now linked with our website as well as the various Companion Societies. Other pathology societies and institutions, including the American Board of Pathology (ABP) are accessible from the website. Already educational materials from previous Short Courses, Specialty Conferences, and Companion Society handouts are available with more to follow in the future. It is foreseen that the website will have an increasing role to play in the educational mission of the USCAP which is only to grow over the next several years with the need for maintenance of certification of the time-limited ABP basic certificate, and the Pathology Residency Programs' competencies programs.

The Education and Publication Committees, chaired respectively by Victor Reuter, M.D. and Richard Zarbo, M.D., D.D.S., are the "work horse" committees of the Academy. The Education Committee had the responsibility of reviewing 2059 scientific abstracts for this meeting, slightly above the 2028 abstracts last year. One can only conclude that the electronic submission of abstracts has gained almost instantaneous and universal acceptance with approximately 90% online submissions for the 2002 meeting and 95% for this meeting. Dr. Richard Zarbo and the Publication Committee, our de facto informatics committee, have had an important role to play in the online activities in so far as our journals are concerned and as a resource in the development of the website. The Publication Committee together with the Executive Committee are in the process of accepting applications for the editorship of Laboratory Investigation. The terms of Drs. Jon Morrow and Jose Costa, the current co-editors, are soon to expire. The selection of editors for our journals is one of the most important decisions that is made by these representative committees of the Academy.

This educational offerings in the forms of the Long Course, Short Courses and Special Courses allow us to scan the panorama and plumb the depths of this discipline known as pathology. There are 21 companion societies symposia and 16 evening specialty conferences. This year for the first time specialty conference case slides with clinical histories were made available on the website prior to the meeting and diagnoses and handouts will be there after the meeting. It will no longer be necessary to scurry from room to room gathering up stacks of paper. That activity can take place with the click of a mouse. Drs. Jonathan I. Epstein and Peter A. Humphrey have brought together the Who's Who of prostate pathology in the Long Course entitled "Prostate Cancer Pathology and Pathobiology."

The relevance of their topic is obvious as one reflects upon the tray of yesterday's biopsies and tomorrow's radical prostatectomy. There are 59 Short Courses and two Special Courses on molecular pathology, one an introductory course by Drs. Julia A. Bridge and Margie A. Scott and the other at the advanced level by Drs. Frederic G. Barr and Ethel Cesarman. If prostate cancer were not timely enough, then the Nathan Kaufman Timely Topics lecture will be presented by Dr. Irving Weissman on "Stem Cell Biology: Past, Present and Future." Dr. Weissman is Professor of Pathology and Developmental Biology at the Stanford University School of Medicine. The Maude Abbott Lecture will be given by Dr. James Downing, Chairman of Pathology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital whose lecture is entitled "The Molecular Pathology of Leukemia."

One of the highlights of our Annual Meeting is the opportunity to recognize colleagues and mentors in some instances. These are individuals whose contributions to pathology are deemed noteworthy as leaders and experts in their particular area and/or service to the Academy with distinction. This year's awardees have qualified in both realms. The F.K. Mostofi Distinguished Service Award recipient is Dr. Elaine Jaffe, past President of the Academy whose contributions to her specialty of hematopathology and the Academy are multitudinous. She was the force behind the renaissance of the Membership Committee. The initiatives from this committee were translated into the Ambassador Program by Dr. Fred Silva, Secretary-Treasurer/ Executive Director, with a significant increase in Junior membership, the future life blood of the Academy as noted earlier. Dr. Richard Kempson, another past president of the Academy, is the recipient of the Distinguished Pathologist Award. His scientific contributions in surgical pathology have encompassed those "bread and butter" areas of breast and gynecologic pathology and soft tissue pathology. He has served as one of our most effective advocates of the specialty of surgical pathology, not at all surprising for a former trainee of Dr. Lauren V. Ackerman. The President's Award allows the president of the Academy to recognize a notable individual of his/her choosing. Dr. Kamal G. Ishak, the dean of hepatopathologists in my opinion, has served the Academy over many years with his encyclopedic short course on liver pathology. There are few other individuals that I am aware of who have as many "classic" papers in their curriculum vitae as Dr. Ishak including his studies on the morphologic distinction between hepatoblastoma and hepatocellular carcinoma in children, epithelioid hemangioendothelioma of the liver, biliary cystadenoma and cystadeocarcinoma and undifferentiated embryonal sarcoma of the liver to name a few examples. His scholarly contributions are only surpassed by his qualities as a great human being. This year's Young Investigator Award is presented to Dr. Julia A. Bridge for her trailblazing work in solid tumor cytogenetics and molecular cytogenetics.

The year has gone by all too quickly, as they seem to do at this stage of my life. Serving as the president of our Academy has been an undeserved honor, especially when I peruse the roster of my predecessors in this position. I feel as though I have grown up in the Academy having given my first platform presentation at the Annual Meeting in 1967 if my memory serves me correctly. For several years, I gave a short course entitled, "Surgical Pathology of Infancy and Childhood" which motivated me to write a book on the topic. The Academy has been an integral part of my development as a pathologist. The essence of the existence of the Academy is the role that it plays and has played in the educational and scholarly lives of almost five generations of pathologists with the soon to be centennial in 2006 of the founding of the International Association of Medical Museums whose name was changed to the International Academy of Pathology in 1955. It is difficult not to be optimistic about the future of the Academy.

May this 92nd meeting be a rewarding one for all of us.

Louis P. Dehner, M.D.
Washington University Medical Center
St. Louis, Missouri
March 2003