Journal of Pediatric Surgery 52 (2017) 1885
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Pediatric Surgery
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jpedsurg
Report of Meeting
Report of the 50th annual meeting of the Pacific Association of Pediatric
Surgeons, Seattle, Washington, USA, May 28–June 1, 2017
Kenneth K.Y. Wong ⁎
Department of Surgery, The University of Hong Kong, Queen Mary Hospital, 102 Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 17 August 2017
Accepted 28 August 2017
Key words:
Meeting
Report
PAPS
This year marks the special occasion of the 50th Annual Meeting of
the Pacific Association of Pediatric Surgeons and was held from May
28th to June 1st, 2017, at the Marriott Waterfront, Seattle, USA. Seattle
is a beautiful coastal city in the state of Washington with a population
of around 700,000.
The meeting was hosted by Dr. John Meehan. This year, there were
439 registered delegates (367 surgeons) from more than 10 countries
around the Pacific Rim and afar. The opening ceremony was held in
wonderful sunshine on the rooftop of the Bell Harbor Convention Centre
on Sunday, May 28th, 2017.
Dr. Bill Chiu took over the chair of the scientific committee this year
from Dr. Mark Holterman. There were a total of 344 abstracts, with 142
oral presentations. Over the course of 4 days, we saw a large number of
high quality presentations. The PAPS Prize oral presentation for trainees
this year was again divided into a basic science session (6 abstracts) and
a clinical session (30 abstracts). The eventual prize winners were Dr.
Jamie Harris for her presentation entitled “Manipulation of variables in
local controlled release vincristine treatment in neuroblastoma” (Basic
Science) and Dr. Erin Ward for “Prophylactic Ladd Procedure is Associat-
ed with Increased Risk of Subsequent Volvulus in Patients with Congen-
ital Diaphragmatic Hernia and Abdominal Wall Defects” (Clinical). We
congratulate them on their awards, and the corresponding manuscripts
are also published in this issue of the Journal.
The Guest Assistant Program Committee, chaired by Dr. Marilyn Butler,
selected a new GAP fellow, Dr. Jack Mulu, from Papua, New Guinea, to at-
tend this year's meeting.
⁎ Tel.: +852 22553486.
E-mail address: kkywong@hku.hk.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jpedsurg.2017.08.053
0022-3468/© 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
© 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
The Gans Memorial Lecture was given by Jens Voight, a legend in the
world of cycling. His talk, entitled: “Born in East Germany, Behind the
Iron Curtain”, enlightened us on the life of a child growing up in the pre-
viously communist country of East Germany, and how this shaped his
eventual professional cycling career.
As this was a special PAPS meeting, we also invited Dr. John Pitkin to
give a talk on: “The Unique Place of Music in the History of PAPS”. This
talk brought back good memories for many of the members.
The publications committee held the publication committee meeting
on the Sunday morning as usual and decisions to accept, revise, or reject
submitted manuscripts were made. This year the committee was
again chaired by Dr. Ken Wong. Overall, there was a record of 97 manu-
scripts submitted for consideration of publication. Accepted manuscripts
are all published in this issue. My 3-year term ends this year, and Dr. Eric
Scaife will take over my position as Chair of the Publication Committee
next year.
The highlight of the conference was the tour on Tuesday. We took a
coach journey to visit the Boeing factory, the Space Needle, and the
Chihuly Garden. Those of us who went on the tour were all amazed by
the scale of the Boeing factory.
The annual PAPS banquet was held in the Museum of Flight on
Wednesday evening. Dr. Walter Chwals handed over the presidency to
Dr. Cynthia Reyes. The banquet was concluded with the usual Songfest,
hosted by Drs. Raj Kumar and John Meehan. This was a memorable
event in the PAPS tradition.
The final celebration of this special 50th Anniversary of PAPS was
concluded by a boat trip and dinner at Rosario Island, the location of
the 1st PAPS meeting.
Next year's meeting will be in Sapporo, Japan, May 13–17, 2018, con-
vened by Dr. Tatsuo Kuroda. Future meetings include Christchurch, New
Zealand, in 2019 and Bali, Indonesia, in 2020.