The 47th Annual VESS Winter Meeting at Sun Valley was a great meeting this year with increased expansion of programming targeted at vascular trainees and early career vascular surgeons. I am overwhelmed and excited to serve as the Society’s 2024-2025 President. Writing this takes me back to many firsts in my life that happened at the winter meeting and the evolution of some of the strongest friendships in my professional career. It was the first place I presented my research, and then a year later, I coached one of my trainees to present our work. The scientific portion of the VESS meeting has always drawn work that pushes where we are as vascular surgeons and questions what the future of our field will look like.
But more than science, VESS is a place to build lifelong friendships and mentorship relationships. It was where I first learned to snowmobile with Jason Lee and every year since have gone out with Matt Smeds and his family snowmobiling adding to our group the families of Dawn Coleman and Bernadette Aulivola. It’s where Caitlin Hicks and her husband have watched me go the wrong way on the slopes, so I now wear an Airtag making sure someone can keep track of me. Moreover, it is where I have watched new members bring the kids and have some time for both science and family.
While skiing has never been my passion, spending time with other early career vascular surgeons allowed me to connect and check the experiences and challenges I met when I started my career. Was it just me that had block time from midnight to 5 am? How many grants would I be rejected by before I would get one? Has anyone ever seen a case like this crazy case I was about to do in two weeks, for which I was not sure of a definitive plan? Connecting with my colleagues across the United States over these experiences has made me and everyone who attends the VESS meeting the strong surgeons we are today.
The 2024-2025 year is going to be even better for VESS. This winter meeting, we launched an Early Career Faculty experience led by Karan Garg, focused on what young surgeons need to know about the business of vascular surgery. This is in addition to the General Surgery Resident Program, the Vascular Fellows’ Program and the Next Generation Student Mentor Program. 2024 will also mark the launch of the VESS Research Fellowship under the Leadership of Liz Genovese. This 2-year research fellowship will continue to help members and trainees develop groundbreaking research to transform vascular surgery for the years to come. We will get to see some of the work presented at the 48th Annual VESS meeting in Breckenridge, CO so start planning your trip for February 2025. I will see you all there.
Misty Humphries, MD
University of California, Davis
President 2024-2025