Though DDW is a few months away, the AGA is already planning for an outstanding meeting in Los Angeles May 20-26. DDW is an opportunity to learn about cutting-edge science, as well as a time to meet with friends and colleagues in a scientific, educational and social setting - something my wife Kristin and I look forward to every year. We particularly enjoy catching up with what has happened to friends and our "extended GI family" during the past year.

During DDW, the AGA will bestow awards to our most notable members - distinguished clinicians, educators and mentors. We will give our most prestigious award, the Julius Friedenwald Medal, to Norton J. Greenberger, MD. A past president of the AGA, Dr. Greenberger is currently Clinical Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. We will honor his lifetime contributions to gastroenterology.

We will also honor Barry Marshall, MD, winner of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery that H. pylori causes peptic ulcers. He will receive the AGA's William Beaumont Prize in Gastroenterology, which recognizes an individual who has made a major contribution (a single accomplishment or series of accomplishments) that has significantly advanced GI basic or clinical research. A number of other educators, clinicians and mentors will also be honored.

For the first time, the AGA will host a Forum on Legislative, Regulatory and Reimbursement Issues at DDW. I hope you'll attend this Tuesday afternoon session, which will leave you with a better picture of government forces that affect the science and practice of gastroenterology - and how the AGA is working for you in Washington.

Some of the issues that will be discussed include: quality in practice, conscious sedation, imaging services, CMS's five-year code review, the RUC, the CPT process, the Medicare physician payment formula, multiple-scope discount, NIH funding and the National Commission on Digestive Diseases. AGA leaders will attend this interactive session where you can tell us what you think about our work on the legislative, regulatory and reimbursement fronts.

This year's Spring Postgraduate Course at DDW is designed to highlight various aspects of contemporary GI practice that entail some degree of "risk" to the patient, the physician or both. I want to thank program chair Colin Howden, MD, and co-directors Guadalupe Garcia-Tsao, MD, John M. Inadomi, MD, and David C. Metz, MD, who have created a program focusing on understanding and calculating risk reduction in various GI diseases. You'll find that the course offers immediately applicable clinical information about the difficult task of balancing the benefits with the risks in the day-to-day management of our patients. I look forward to seeing you there.

Sincerely,