Timothy R. Deer, MD, chairman of the American Society of Pain and Neuroscience (ASPN), discusses the society's goals, its rapid growth, and how ASPN is collaborating with different stakeholders to improve patient care and offer a wider range of new and innovative treatment options for patients with chronic intractable pain. To find out more, including what’s new in neuromodulation, minimally invasive spine and regenerative medicine, listen to the following video recorded live at the ASPN 2024 Annual Conference held July 11-14, 2024 in Miami Beach, FL. A link to download the complete transcript of the interview is also provided below.
SmartTRAK: Anne Staylor here with SmartTRAK. I'm at the beautiful Fontainebleau Hotel in balmy Miami Beach, Florida at the American Society of Pain and Neuroscience Annual Conference. Today is the last day of the conference and I have the pleasure of talking with Dr. Tim Deer, the chairman of ASPN. Dr. Deer, thank you for talking with me today.
Dr. Tim Deer: Anne, thank you so much for having me. It's a great pleasure to talk to you and thank you for coming to our meeting.
Yes. Well, as you know, I think three years ago was the last time I was at your meeting, and I've had a colleague cover it who lives on the East Coast since then. Now I'm back covering the meeting and wow, has it grown exponentially since you and Dr. Sayed co-founded this meeting. I think this year, there's been a lot of energy and vibrancy around the content and in the exhibit hall and honestly, there's so much news for me to cover.
But before we get into the meeting, I thought it'd be a good idea to have you start by talking about the meeting itself, how it's grown, what the attendance has been this year, et cetera. And then what have been some of the key goals of society? And what have you and your vice chair, Dr. Sayed, been working toward as a society since you established the meeting?
TD: Anne, I'm so happy because our goal in '18, when we founded the society was to create a home for multiple people from different areas of our field. And that included physicians, young physicians, fellows, residents, older physicians who add value from wisdom and experience; industry, because they're such an important partner of ours, and a transparent relationship with industry is so important; and scientists; and then really all those who are stakeholders in improving patient access and care because it's a battle out there. We have to work hard to help with patient access to anything innovative.
And innovation's been one of our other main goals. And at this meeting this year, I think it all came together so beautifully, seeing all the new innovation and research. The science here was fantastic. And last night, for example, we had a reception. I met about 100 residents who were here, who are excited about our field. And when we excite people who are residents and fellows, it really is rewarding because they are going to change millions of lives going forward.
So I think our main goal was to change lives, but to do it in a way that we're like a family. Many societies are bureaucratic or they feel very, maybe starchy may be the word. And our society wants to feel organic and really embracing to our colleagues. So I guess the overall arching message of this meeting was let's embrace together as a family helping patients.
Do you know what the attendance was?
TD: Yes, we had about 2,000 healthcare providers and about 2,000 non-healthcare providers.
It was crazy.
TD: Think we had about 4,000 people here. We've grown from 100 members back in '18 to probably one of the largest societies in the world for spine and pain, over 8,000 members now, so the growth has been crazy. And our fastest growing segments right now are young innovators, people five years or less, including fellows and residents. And international, we're seeing a major growth internationally in our component ISPN, which we'll have our next meeting there in London in '25.
So seeing growth in America, we're seeing growth among our normal colleagues. We're seeing growth among all kind of industry partners with startup companies doing new things. But that growth among young people and that growth among the international colleagues is very exciting to me.
What about the research? There certainly has been a huge amount of new research at this meeting.
TD: Amazing. We had, I think seven new Level 1 studies presented here that normally would've been presented at North American Spine or North American Neuromodulation or somewhere else. They're bringing their research here now for the Level 1 studies. And really three of my favorite papers were ...
Click the button below to download and read the full transcript of the interview 'Evolving Ideas into Innovation and Practice' with ASPN Chairman Dr. Tim Deer, conducted by Anne Staylor, SmartTRAK's Executive Editor and VP & GM of Neuro Therapies.
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