REACHING THE NEW HORIZON Mark Meissner, MD, FAVLS • AVLS President
Margaret Thatcher is credited for the statement, “Plan your work for today and every day, then work your plan.” This profound statement is applicable in all facets of business and life. The AVLS adopted this approach to our Society decades ago and structured our leadership and staff to ensure that, although changes occur, the goals and objectives of the Society remain steady. The AVLS leadership and staff are to be good stewards of the long-range plan rather than change our agenda every few years. The AVLS is truly unique among medical societies in this regard, and this mindset has contributed to our success. In 2015 at the 2nd Executive Leadership Summit (ELS), we came together and agreed upon a variety of objectives and initiatives that ultimately became our 5-year Strategic Plan known as “New Horizons.” The Society built this plan on the background of previous strategies dating from 2003 when the Society decided to pursue specialty recognition for venous & lymphatic medicine. Since then, everything the Society has done and accomplished can be tied back to this core objective. Investments in research, owning our patient data with the PRO Venous Registry and producing evidence-based guidelines;
While we are grateful for our accomplishments, it is time to plan for the next five years, again building upon what we started so many years ago. The Board of Directors for the AVLS and FVLD started their strategic planning process in October of 2021 at the 35th Annual Congress in Denver, CO. Since then, much has been done to determine our plans going forward.
a full-time advocacy director and successfully advocating with payers and policymakers on behalf of the field and our patients; and our core focus on education all fulfill the purpose of “improving patient access to quality venous & lymphatic care.” This idea reaches its pinnacle with the concept of Board Certification and recognition by the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS). Over the past five years, with the New Horizon plan’s success, we are closer than ever to reaching this goal. Thanks to all that have contributed countless hours in volunteer service to the Society and Foundation, especially all that have made financial contributions to the cause. Without you, we would not be where we are today.
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Many of you from our membership and corporate leadership participated in the FVLD feasibility study to provide input into the goals and objectives of our next strategic vision. The thoughts and directions derived from this background work will be presented at the 2022 ELS in Chicago, and we will begin to chart the plan going forward and what will be required to achieve success. With your commitment, we will be able to achieve great and mighty things to further benefit our patients by providing access to the highest quality care! Please know your input is always welcome and always appreciated. We hope you will help us celebrate our successes, but more so, we look forward to working alongside you as we strive for the “Great Expectations,” which lay ahead!
