Patrick Godbey, MD
November 2020—Despite the circumstances that forced us to shift to a virtual event for our annual meeting this year—and my sincere hope we will never have to do so again—I couldn’t be more proud of how everyone in the CAP worked hard to adapt to the COVID-19 pandemic and ensure the best experience possible for all of our pathologists.
As I write this, the annual meeting has just concluded. While every conference we hold requires tremendous effort, this was a different event, a different horse race. The work and persistence that went into making our virtual meeting a success were extraordinary. I would like to congratulate the CAP members and staff on producing it and thank all of the pathologists who gave presentations or tuned in. “We could not have done it without you” is an understatement.
It became clear early on that our annual meeting would likely have to adapt to uncertain times. Amid the many questions about how we would pull it off, there was never a question about whether it would happen. The dedicated CAP staff members began researching options to ensure that if we had to shift to a virtual event, the technology would be in place to support it. I would like to thank the CAP’s George Fiedler for his extensive efforts to implement the virtual meeting platform that allowed our annual meeting community to come together in a new and unusual way.
Supporting virtual events goes well beyond our own annual meeting. I am pleased to report that as part of its commitment to support state pathology societies, the CAP has been providing the needed technology and other resources to allow state groups to hold their own meetings. This emerged from our own member surveys and other research demonstrating that many state pathology societies struggle to hold successful events, particularly when members are far-flung in large states.
Our team, led by Ned Fody, MD, and CAP staff Megan Wick, created this initiative even before the pandemic and launched it this year—just, as you might imagine, in the nick of time. So many state societies would have had to cancel their meetings this year but instead were able to build on the CAP resources and shift to a virtual mode. Of the state pathology societies that regularly hold annual meetings, more than half hosted this year’s events with virtual technology support from the CAP. This is a complimentary service we offer to all state pathology societies because it is important to keep pathologists engaged at both the state and federal levels. To learn more about it, please visit www.cap.org/states.
For me, one of the highlights of this year’s CAP annual meeting was selecting the fellows who would receive President’s Honor awards. Many of the honorees were chosen for their remarkable contributions to the CAP’s efforts to benefit its members and their patients during this pandemic, the story that has defined pathology in 2020. Honorees include Timothy Allen, Rajesh Dash, Eric Glassy, Mark Hanly, Donald Karcher, Karen Kaul, Jonathan Myles, Raouf Nakhleh, Bobbi Pritt, and Richard Scanlan. It was also my privilege to award a posthumous President’s Honor to former CAP president Gene Herbek for always working in the best interests of our members.
Another important part of the annual meeting was welcoming the new members to our Board of Governors and various committees. It is truly gratifying to see CAP pathologists getting more involved with our organization on every level, and I hope this trend will continue for many years to come.
And, of course, I am truly grateful to Anthony Fauci, MD, for taking the time to join our annual meeting as a keynote speaker. His expertise and commitment to infectious disease have been invaluable in the response to COVID-19. His presentation at CAP20 was frank, enlightening, and important for our entire community. I must say, I enjoyed my interaction with Dr. Fauci.
Finally, I’d like to welcome Alain Borczuk, MD, as the new editor-in-chief of our peer-reviewed journal, Archives of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine. Alain is chief of thoracic pathology and professor of pathology at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York. He is a strong advocate for quality assurance and compliance and has been an active member of CAP laboratory inspection teams. We were honored to have several excellent candidates to choose from for this important post, and we look forward to having Alain officially take over in January. I would also like to thank Donna Hansel, MD, for her great stewardship of the journal in her role as interim editor.
Thank you to all who worked so hard to put together a memorable meeting. We made the best of a bad situation. In this race, we were given a bad post position but got out of the gate and pulled away in the stretch. We were, and are, winners.
Dr. Godbey welcomes communication from CAP members. Write to him at [email protected].