A New Newsletter for a New Society
By Rita Agarwal, MD
Children's Hospital of Colorado
Denver, CO
This is the first edition of the SPPM Newsletter, and a thrilling time for all of us who are engaged in acute pain, regional and/or chronic pain management. The SPPM started as a Special Interest Group in Pediatric Pain Management initially organized by Corrie T.M. Anderson, MD, FAAP (Seattle Children’s Hospital).
The effort was then taken over by Sabine Kost-Byerly, MD (Johns Hopkins University) and me, and is the culmination of dedicated efforts by many people. Sabine was truly the driving force that catapulted the group to a new level. She wrote the initial by-laws, organized all the business meetings, kept minutes and contact information for all interested members and kept everyone focused and on track. Several other people deserve special mention for their enthusiasm, hard work and support in the creation of this wonderful new society. Drs. Rosalie Tassone, Anjana Kundu, Petra Meier, M-Irfan Suleman, Robert Wilder, Stephan Hays and Giovanni Cucchiaro were invaluable helpers. Drs. Charles Berde, Steven Weisman, Kenneth Goldschneider, Jeffery Galinkin, David Polaner and Thomas Vetter were all early and frequent speakers at the SIGPPM Education Conferences.
I know there are many other wonderful people to thank, and I apologize if I have not given you a shout out here. Finally, none of this would have been possible without the tremendous help and unfailing support of the SPA and Ruggles. Thank you Nancy Glass, Lynn Martin, the entire SPA Executive Committee and Board of Directors for assisting us and facilitating the process. Stewart Hinckley, Kim Battle and all the staff at Ruggles helped us with our meetings, budget, membership and many other administrative functions. Our gratitude is endless.
The vision of the SPPM is to complement all the other existing societies that have been doing this incredibly important work. The Society is intended to provide a place for those of us who don’t really fit the APS, ASRA or IASP and allow us to stay up to date on the latest research and management strategies.
The society was created to bring all the camps together for the purposes of education, advocacy, and improvement in patient care. Please spread the word to all your colleagues on all your pain services, and encourage them to join. The SPPM and management of pain in patients can only grow stronger with a greater variety of health care professionals contributing their expertise.
The newsletter will distribute information, inform members about upcoming meetings, communicate policies, election information or anything else that members deem valuable, and to publish cases, reviews or articles of interest. We are planning three online editions per year: one in the winter, prior to the SPPM/SPA/AAP meeting, reviewing relevant news from other pain societies, new guidelines, patient advocacy, public policy, as well as a literature review; the second one in the spring, immediately following the SPPM/SPA/AAP meeting, offering an in-depth review of the meeting, and finally the third one in the fall focused on clinical care provision, case reports, pro and con discussions, as well as announcements for and outcomes of elections for SPPM officers.
We will need lots of help. We want all your fantastic ideas and contributions. We can do many interesting and innovative things with this newsletter and organization. Anything goes (well almost anything). Please consider being part of the new and exciting venture. Dr. Anjana Kundu (Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Columbus, Ohio) and I will be organizing the next edition, so if you are going to the SPPM meeting (all of you, right?) and are willing to write a review please let one of us know at [email protected]; or [email protected]
For our first edition Dr. Petra Meier (Children’s Hospital, Boston) has provided a summary of the upcoming SPPM meeting in Tampa Florida. If you haven’t signed up, it is not too late to do so. Dr. Anita Akbar Ali; Dr. Sarah Tariq; and Dr. M-Irfan Suleman from the University of Arkansas, Arkansas Children’s Hospital have contributed a very interesting case on the management of post-dural puncture headache in a child with pseudo tumor cerebri. Dr. Stephen Hays (Vanderbilt) has an end of the year summary of some thought-provoking articles from the Journal of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine.
I hope you enjoy this first edition of the SPPM Newsletter and help us with future newsletters. There will be a business meeting in Tampa with more information on the structure of the Society and future elections.
