The Society of Thoracic Surgeons is excited to reconvene for its 60th Annual Meeting January 27 - 29 in San Antonio, which brings together cardiothoracic surgeons from around the world and features late-breaking scientific research, cutting-edge technologies, innovative cardiothoracic surgery products, and meaningful networking opportunities.
STS 2024 will be held in San Antonio, Texas
This year’s meeting venue, the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, offers attendees – more than 2,000 multidisciplinary cardiothoracic professionals at all career stages – everything they’ll need for a seamless experience with 80 educational sessions throughout the three-day conference.
The morning of Saturday, January 27, kicks off with the Extraordinary Women in Cardiothoracic Surgery Awards Breakfast, which recognizes women surgeons who have achieved excellence in clinical practice and demonstrate integrity, leadership, creativity, and expertise in carrying out day-to-day duties and supporting the specialty.
On Sunday evening, the President's Reception at The Witte Museum – a beautiful and immersive venue "where nature, science, and culture meet – will celebrate the term of current STS President Dr. Tom MacGillivray, as guests experience the history, culture, and natural artifacts of Texas while reuniting with – and meeting new – friends and colleagues.
The STS Annual Meeting exhibit hall will feature live product demonstrations, as well as more than 130 exhibitors showcasing the latest tools and technologies for surgical practice. Conference goers will not want to miss the CT Surgery Resident Showdown final, where the North American and European champions will face off against each other in a test of knowledge.
For the first time, the meeting will include a hub for early career surgeons. At The Hub, located next to the Exhibit Hall, you’ll find early career roundtable discussions with STS leaders, a trainee symposium, a mock oral exam course, an early career insight talk by Dr. Leah Backhus, and more. You also can join your peers in a “painting with a purpose” art installation activity for the Shriners Children's Texas in Galveston.
Attendees will also be able to engage in wellbeing activities, such as step tracking, wellness-related educational sessions, a golf simulator, and more. Industry symposia, held onsite during lunch and offsite in the mornings and evenings, offer opportunities to explore new techniques and interventions. Two exhibit hall theaters will allow attendees to experience e-posters and interactive industry presentations.
There’s still time to register, add ticketed events, and start planning your San Antonio experience at sts.org/annualmeeting.
In this episode of The Resilient Surgeon, Dr. Michael Maddaus interviews Monica Parker, author of The Power of Wonder: The Extraordinary Emotion That Will Change the Way You Live, Learn, and Lead.
Parker has spent decades helping people discover how to lead and live wonderfully by cultivating curiosity, empathy, and open mindedness. Here, she explains the elements and elicitors of wonder, and how it can transform people's brains and bodies. It's about "becoming more wonder-prone and reconnecting with a reverence for the world and all the magic in it."
The editors of the European Journal of Cardio-Thoracic Surgery (EJCTS), The Annals of Thoracic Surgery, and The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery (JTCVS) recognize the value of a streamlined and consistent submission process. To provide a simplified experience for our authors as they submit, we have harmonized our submission requirements for full-length original research articles. The newly aligned standards are listed below:
4,500 word count maximum (this includes all elements of the manuscript)
Maximum combined limit of seven figures and tables
40 reference maximum
Strict adherence to the AMA Manual of Style for citations
No limit to the number of videos an author can submit
These changes are intended to reduce confusion and save time for our busy authors. These unified requirements will make it easier to resubmit to a different journal, if needed. Additionally, strict adherence to AMA style will make it easier for our authors to use reference management tools such as EndNote, Zotero, and Mendeley.
We are confident that this congruency will simplify the user experience when submitting to EJCTS, JTCVS, and The Annals.
Sincerely,
Joanna Chikwe, MD, Editor-in-Chief, STS Journals
G. Alexander Patterson, MD, Editor-in-Chief, AATS Journals
Matthias Siepe, MD, EACTS Editor-in-Chief
In this episode of The Resilient Surgeon, Gloria Mark, PhD, Chancellor’s Professor of Informatics at the University of California, Irvine, explains how people interact with information technology in their everyday life: How it affects multitasking, attention, mood, and above all, stress. She studies people's behavior in real-world settings and has found that most people experience information overload, which continues to shrink their attention spans.
Lung cancer is the deadliest cancer in the U.S. Early detection of lung cancer through low-dose computed tomography (LDCT) screening has been shown to significantly reduce lung cancer mortality in high-risk populations and is currently recommended annually by the U.S.
Physicians undergo extensive technical training to develop the required expertise for the responsible care of patients. Cardiothoracic surgery training is narrow and deep and rarely addresses skills necessary for effective communication, the cultivation of self-awareness, listening, and what it takes to build high-performing teams. Dr. Frank Rosinia and Dr.
In observance of Lung Cancer Awareness Month, STS participated in a congressional press conference focused on the importance of lung cancer screening hosted on the U.S. Capitol grounds on Thursday, November 16. The event, hosted by Congresswoman Kathy Castor (D-FL), aimed to bring attention to the urgent need to get more people screened for lung cancer.
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Dr. Keith Mortman with Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz
STS joined other key stakeholders in the lung cancer community at this event, including LUNGevity Foundation, American Lung Association, GO2 for Lung Cancer, Moffitt Cancer Center, the Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL).
STS has a long history of advocating for robust patient access to lung cancer prevention, screenings, and treatment. “Over the past decade, significant progress has been made to expand insurance coverage of lung cancer screening, yet this press conference highlighted that significant challenges remain to increasing screening rates among at-risk individuals,” said Keith Mortman, MD, who participated in the press conference and is a member of the STS Workforce on Health Policy, Reform, and Advocacy. “While innovative treatments for lung cancer are rapidly emerging, not everyone has equal access to these cutting-edge treatments. STS is relentlessly advocating with policymakers in Washington to remove barriers and increase access so our members can offer the highest quality lung cancer care possible.”
To advance this priority, STS has advocated for H.R. 4286, Increasing Access to Lung Cancer Screening Act, a bipartisan bill introduced by Reps. Brian Higgins (D-NY), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), and Kathy Castor (D-FL), that would require all state Medicaid programs to cover lung cancer screenings for eligible enrollees as recommended by the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force (USPSTF). Urge your lawmakers to support this legislation today.
On November 2, 2023, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule final rule. Despite vocal opposition from The Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS) and many others in the physician community, this rule finalizes a greater than 3% reduction to physician reimbursement beginning January 1, 2024.
When adjusted for inflation, Medicare physician payments have declined by 26% since 2001. This latest reduction is the most recent example of a trend that is unsustainable and impacts patient access to care. These cuts are due to the implementation of the flawed complexity add-on code G2211, combined with expiring temporary relief previously enacted by Congress. The final rule also contains a few positive developments. CMS agreed with STS’s concerns that raising the required threshold to avoid a penalty in the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) from 75 to 82 points was inappropriate at this time because the MIPS program has been largely paused since 2019 due the COVID-19 pandemic. CMS also approved several new intraoperative cardiac ultrasound CPT codes (76987–76989) at higher levels than in the proposed rule, which will be available to cardiothoracic surgeons next year.
Fortunately, the Senate Finance Committee recently released a draft legislative proposal that seeks to extend relief payments for physicians that are slated to expire this year. If enacted, this would help counteract a portion of the cuts slated for 2023. STS will continue to urge Congress to halt this unsustainable cut and to enact policies such as H.R. 2474, the Strengthening Medicare for Patients and Providers Act, which would provide an annual automatic inflation update for physician payments going forward. Help us maintain adequate Medicare reimbursements by contacting your lawmakers now!
Learn more about STS’s advocacy efforts focused on the 2024 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule.
