The 2018 Annual Meeting of the American Association of Swine Veterinarians in San Diego, California was a record-setting event. With your support, we achieved record overall and international attendance. I want to thank the program planning committee for a job well done. Your great ideas and willingness to individually chair sessions made the meeting a success. I also want to thank Sue Schulteis, Tom Burkgren, and Harry Snelson for all your behind-the-scenes work. There is a lot you do to make the meeting run smoothly.

I’m thankful for the opportunity to be president of this wonderful organization for the next year. I’ve given some thought to goals and objectives. Our mission to educate swine veterinarians continues to be relevant and worthy. That said, our position as the “go-to” source of knowledge about swine health, production and welfare can continue to be strengthened. How do we utilize the knowledge and relationships we have to be more effective?

I believe the answer is in communication and collaboration.

This year at the annual meeting, we started a social media initiative where we encouraged participants to communicate on various social media platforms using #AASV2018. I think it was a great success! I hope that we build on this for #AASV2019! Our next meeting in Orlando, Florida will be the 50th anniversary of the organization so there will be lots to share! Erin Brenneman’s presentation on how she uses social media was wonderful in sharing how we can communicate what we do in an effective way. I encourage you to use her example and others to increase our visibility and influence as swine veterinarians. Thank you to Dr Lisa Tokach for leading the social media efforts at the annual meeting.

In the Howard Dunne and Alec Hogg Memorial Lectures, we also heard some thought-provoking ideas for our organization from Drs Bill DuBois and Rodger Main. Dr DuBois shared his ideas on how we can be of service to food production systems throughout the world and challenged us to increase our international membership. I appreciate the thought and work that went into his presentation. The goodwill that can be generated and the relationships that can be forged through international collaboration are imperative in the current environment of global trade and health.

Dr Main shared his vision for how we can better influence the health of the North American swine herd and presented a model for the US Swine Health Improvement Plan. This system of collaboration would offer practical benefits for endemic disease control and allow us to better respond to new or emerging disease threats in the United States.

And finally, the work of our AASV Foundation is so important to furthering our mission. Thank you to Dr Butch Baker and all those who have championed this worthy organization’s efforts. Without your contributions of time and finances, we would not be able to support research and education for our membership. The AASV Foundation has lofty goals for the next year and I encourage all of you to support these causes.

Let’s look forward to celebrating our 50th anniversary and continuing our legacy! Thank you so much for all you do.

C. Scanlon Daniels, DVM
AASV President