I’ve had the pleasure of spending the last few days at the World Congress of Cardiology in Dubai. The schedule was packed, but it’s truly been an honor to represent the College along with my colleagues President-Elect John Harold, MD, MACC, former Presidents Drs Bove, Beller, Conti, King, and Board member Eric Bates, MD, FACC, among others. The global reach of the College is tangible here. Among several presentations was an ACC symposium on achieving the Triple Aim in cardiovascular healthcare, a topic that I also address in this week's President Page in JACC.

Since Wednesday I’ve met with the ACC Saudi Heart Association, the Emirates Cardiac Society and the Lebanese Cardiology Society, gone on rounds at the American Hospital Dubai and visited The Health Care City, an amazing health care facility. I also joined other society leaders on Thursday morning at a joint leadership meeting on cardiovascular disease – at topic that Dr. Harold expanded upon in terms of prevention at a session later in the day.

Friday provided a very important opportunity for World Heart Federation members, of which the ACC is a part, to discuss where we currently are with developing a global framework for combating non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Nearly a year after the special UN Summit on the topic, it’s important that we continue to make progress and move the ball forward in addressing this global issue. A important achievement was that the Global Cardiovascular Disease Taskforce, made up of leadership from the world’s largest cardiovascular disease organizations including the American Heart Association, American College of Cardiology, European Heart Network, European Society of Cardiology and the World Heart Federation called on the 12,000 World Congress of Cardiology delegates in Dubai, and the CV disease community at large, to support the adoption of a global goal to reduce premature non-communicable disease mortality by 25 percent by 2025, one of the most important goals targeted by the NCD alliance.

In other exciting news for the College, in Dubai we officially launched the Thailand ACC Chapter and the United Arab Emirates ACC Chapter, bringing the total number of ACC Chapters to 20. Just three weeks ago at ACC.12 in Chicago we spoke about reaching this milestone before the end of the year – little did we dream we would reach our goal in two weeks!  We look forward to working with all of our international chapters and members globally in enhancing education, quality of care and bidirectional exchange of knowledge.

The ACC’s leadership in the development of guidelines, performance measures and registries, as well as our innovation in terms of educational programs and products, allows us to play an important role abroad. Quality patient-centered care knows no borders…

Look for more details on ACC’s activities in Dubai in the May/June issue of Cardiology, hitting mailboxes later next month. Photos will also be posted on the ACC’s Facebook page.

 

< Back to Listings