Dear members of the BSCRS, dear friends,

Also this year we combine our General Assembly with the Winter Meeting of our Society. My talk will be short, so those of you that are hungry : don’t worry.

As your president for the last 3 years, it is my duty to look back not only to learn from our failures but certainly also to make things better for the future.

The idea of a full day session for the general ophthalmologist at the OB-meeting and a separate Winter Meeting with live or near-live surgery is now widely accepted by our members. This year we have added a contact lens session to our Winter Meeting, as we planned to do every 2 years.
In the future it is our intention to combine the Winter Meeting with ophthalmologic societies of the Netherlands and Northern France. One meeting out of two would be held in Belgium, and the other abroad, alternating between the Dutch and the French societies.

Last year, I expressed our intention to improve communication with our members.
I hope everybody receives our “Flash News” now, reporting on the activities of our Board. However we are still searching for a more eye-catching layout…
With the help of a professional we are improving the quality of our website, by upgrading the content as well as by making it more practically accessible.
The aim is to make it possible for our members to log in to the presentations and lectures of the BSCRS session at OB as of this meeting. A password will be accorded to log in. Of course the copyright of these presentations will have to be respected.

Regarding professional and legal defence, thanks to the combined effort of our society with the two other organisations (BBO/UOBMO and SOOS), we obtained last year what almost seemed to be impossible.
Ophthalmic surgery (and ophthalmic only !) can be performed in an extramurall centre and will be refunded by our social security system.
This is really a revolution in the way we perform our job. And evidently, our society will continue, in co-operation with SOOS, to give you help and advice during this exciting transition period.

Finally, I would like to thank all the speakers of today for their kind co-operation and to give my special thanks to Bernard Mathys for the practical organisation of this great Winter Meeting.

Thank you.

Robert Van Horenbeeck
President of BSCRS

Speech of the President at the General Assembly 2010