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At the 1988 annual meeting, under the presidency of Dr. Bryan Hubble, a record 70 papers were submitted, of which 49 were accepted. (This compared very well indeed with the eight to ten papers presented at the first meeting 27 years earlier.) The program was, in fact, so impressive, that 23 industry companies held exhibits, in part due to the follow-up efforts of Mrs. Hubble and Dr. Hubble’s office staff.
Having such a good variety of exhibitors added to the learning experience and brought in significant additional revenue to the MAPS coffers. 1988 was also the year when poster sessions were started, to supplement the oral presentations. The position of Historian-Archivist was created that year, to which Dr. George Pap was appointed by the president. The idea of officially beginning to save and collect historical data and MAPS memorabilia was a precursor of the project write a 30-year-plus MAPS history, which came into being a few years later, in 1994, and was completed in early 1995.
There has always been a mixture of case presentations, research papers, personal vignettes, and state-of-the-art papers. In recent years, research and scholarly papers presented by the faculty and residents from the university training centers have gained more exposure and a greater number of time slots on the program. The response from the membership has been at times very positive, but occasionally also critical, as many surgeons in private practice do not want to see the annual MAPS meeting become a platform where academic activity is the primary focus. Yet a fast scanning of the 1994 meeting program still shows that the traditional balance has not been lost:
1) There were award-winning papers of a clinical nature on plastic, reconstructive, and microvascular surgery
2) There were reports on volunteer missions by plastic surgeons in Vellore, India, at the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota and a historical vignette about plastic surgeons in the past and their contributions to the specialty.
3) There were research papers ,exhibits on the use of computers in plastic surgery and reports on experimental procedures still in the animal trials stages.
4) There were presentations on unusual complications and their possible solutions, and on technique in aesthetic as well as maxillo- and cranio-facial surgery.
5) There were papers on burns, the pharmacology and microbiology of wound healing and the use of genetic “fingerprinting.”
6) There were reports on hospital costs and outcomes and the new endoscopic techniques. An impartial outsider scanning this program would have no problems agreeing that there was something for everybody at the 1994 annual meeting.
With the exception, perhaps, of the original Confession Session – a highlight of the MAPS meeting for decades – which seemed to have disappeared from the program. This Saturday morning session, however we were told, is staging a comeback, due to membership demand.
When the change to a second generation began at MAPS, it was time to start recording some historical facts of the organization. This had to be done before the people who remembered that information, or had saved pertinent documents, became unavailable or no longer interested in preserving the memories. One good sign that the time to write a history of MAPS had come was the fact that a new generation of MAPS members, including some sons of senior members, was becoming active in the association. Three cases came to mind, in part because the senior link in the two-generation chain was a prominent surgeon with proven leadership credentials, and the junior member joined MAPS early in his career:
1) Drs. Francis (Sammy) and Christian Paletta, the father having been president of the American Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons in 1968; and the son following, in his footsteps, in practice, academic activity, and MAPS membership.
2) Drs. Abraham and John Hiebert, the father having been honorary president of MAPS in 1977; and the son, a member and secretary of MAPS in 1994, 17 years later.
3) Drs. Tom and Mark Kendall, the father having been MAPS president in 1985; and the son having just joined in 1994.
We are not aware of any MAPS fathers and daughters yet, but that, too, will come. And there are more father-son chains in the making, even as we write these words in late 1994. What does this fact mean? Is it really a suitable metaphor, a symbol that merits a place in this brief history? We believe it is. For when the children of professionals become professionals in their own right and strive to join their fathers’ society, this joining means that the society is a viable, worthy organization, capable of enriching the children’s professional lives, just as it enriched the fathers’ professional lives. For this, we salute the father-son teams and hope there will be more, as they validate MAPS raison d’être, as much as the growing membership and increase in educational programs do.
Since 1988, the role of MAPS as a regional society came up for discussion on several occasions at the annual meeting. Several MAPS members, who are or were also prominently active in the larger national society (ASPRS), such as Drs. Mimis Cohen, Herold Griffith, Peter McKinney and Elvin Zook, have said that this society as well as other regional societies must eventually play a more active role on the national scene. On the other hand, several members also said that, as the national meetings get larger and larger, the regional meetings will also grow – in part because many members will prefer to attend the smaller, less stressful, and less expensive regional meetings. The national ASPRS meetings now draw more than 6,000 people.
Forty years ago, they attracted only 600 people. The MAPS meetings draw 100-150 people and are more informal and relaxed. The national meetings, however, also offer greater opportunity to interact at a higher academic level, a more layered and sophisticated scientific program, greater opportunity to participate in policy-making and political activity, and a larger number of instructional courses on new surgical techniques.
In 1994, ASPRS started organizing a Regional Society Leadership Guide to serve as a resource and as a means to get regional and state societies more involved in the political and economic issues affecting the specialty of plastic and reconstructive surgery. MAPS has always had a significant number of members also involved with ASPRS. This number will probably increase, because of the current rapid changes and political pressures in medicine. In addition, as with other regional societies, MAPS is an excellent platform for developing the leadership qualities and speaking skills that are essential to being noticed at the national level.
Dr. Hugh Johnson went to Vellore, South India, for one year in 1958, on a Fulbright Scholarship, to do volunteer work as a plastic surgeon. Two years after his return to his practice in Rockford, Illinois, he founded the Midwestern Association of Plastic Surgeons. Other plastic surgeons also went abroad to do work in Third World countries, with Interplast, or with Christian missionary organizations. But wasn’t until recently that MAPS undertook – as a regional surgical society – the commitment to do volunteer work in an under served area. Fittingly, that area was not in another country, but right here in the Midwest.
At the June, 1993, meeting in Chicago, there was extensive discussion about the need to include volunteer services as an ongoing program of MAPS. Rosebud, a Lakota-Sioux Reservation in southern South Dakota, was chosen because it has a modern and well-equipped hospital which is currently underutilized. This program was spearheaded by the then President-Elect, Dr. Reid Hansen, and by Dr. Curtis Juhala of Bismarck, North Dakota, who was a friend of the late Native American opera singer, White Eagle Moore. Mr. Moore had been raised on the Rosebud Reservation and was well acquainted with its medical needs.
Rosebud is a medium-sized reservation on the South Dakota-Nebraska border, some 80 – 100 miles east of the Badlands, the Black Hills and the Mount Rushmore tourist attractions. Rosebud is located in a relatively arid area, tucked away from the main tourist traffic and unsuitable for profitable farming. The resident population of about 30,000 people lives at the poverty level. And, despite the presence of a well-appointed hospital, the locals often don’t have easy access to sophisticated medical or surgical care when they need it. Several MAPS members visited the reservation in 1994, including Drs. Hansen, Juhala, Arlen Winsky and Tom Kendall. They received credentials from the Indian Health Service and were able to work with nasal fractures, facial injuries, secondary burn repair and clinical evaluation of future surgeries.
At the time of this writing, (late 1994), the Midwestern Association of Plastic Surgeons was in the process of setting up a continuing program with regularly scheduled visits by plastic surgeons. These doctors will provide evaluation and surgical care several times a year. As in other parts of the world which are sparsely populated and medically underserved, there are many cases of congenital malformations, burns, and traumatic injuries at Rosebud which haven’t been properly treated. MAPS volunteer plastic surgeons interested in gong on a medical mission to Rosebud, for a week or a month, must be prepared to operate under conditions which resemble those of poorer countries. They must also be prepared to be sensitive to the native culture. In addition, they have to be diplomatic with local medical personnel and help them initiate a system of referrals that will bring in the patients in need of plastic surgery from the scattered enclaves in the periphery of the reservation. If this can be gradually accomplished, MAPS will have a good reason to be proud, for it will have added another unique feature to its original profile.
One reason for the successful membership drives of the past few years has been the increasing participation of plastic surgery residents at the annual meetings, many of whom joined MAPS as active members after they finished their training. Greater involvement of training program faculty, recognition of the residents’ work in the form of awards for their best papers, and the fact that the MAPS annual meetings truly have something for everybody, account for the continuing increase in residents’ participation.
If one had to chose one name of a senior plastic surgeon who tirelessly encouraged his residents attend the MAPS meetings, present papers, and be counted, that name would be Ian Jackson. For 15 years now, Dr. Jackson has made it a special point to encourage the young surgeons-in-training, with whom he worked, to attend the meetings and present papers. He did this for years when he was with the Mayo Clinic, and he is still actively doing it from his more recent base in Southfield, Michigan. Other faculty and training program directors have done the same, and the result in the past decade has been a lively but friendly rivalry among the medical centers in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and Michigan, just to mention a few. Cash prizes and plaques continue to be given each year to recognize the best papers.
In 1991, the membership and Board of Trustees voted to permanently name awards after Drs. James Dowd and Hugh Johnson. At the 1994 meeting in Peoria, there were wining papers in eight categories:
Clinical Senior Category:
First and Second Place
Research Senior Category:
First and Second Place
Resident Clinical Category:
First and Second Place
Resident Research Category:
First and Second Place
In addition, two Honorable Mentions were given to recognize presentations made my medical or college students interested in the field of plastic surgery. This awards program is one of the best ways to insure continuity and growth of the membership of MAPS, as well as variety and quality in future annual meeting
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