On behalf of the SASA Gauteng branch and the ARS of the WFSA, welcome to the largest and most inclusive fully hybrid combined anaesthesia meeting ever held on the African continent. The meeting will be held at Sandton Convention Centre over 6 ½ days – featuring a wide range of interactive full and half day workshops on Friday 13 September (many repeated during AAAC); a SASA refresher course on 14 and 15 September and the AAAC from 16 – 19 September inclusive. The congress motto – Inviting the World Back Home - invokes the history of mankind and our hope to attract delegates from all corners of the planet. Our theme is Safety, Innovation and Artificial Intelligence. The faculty includes many highly regarded continental and international teachers. 

The Friday workshops will feature advanced and detailed insights into vital new hard and soft skills in anaesthesia – from transoesophageal and transthoracic echocardiography to conflict resolution and mediation. The SASA refresher course will be presented in its typical weekend format and will include the traditional private practice and nursing refresher courses. That is where the tradition ends as the meeting will feature a panoply of fresh new topics and pop up workshops demonstrating new advances in anaesthetic technology for the generalist anaesthetist.

AAAC will feature 3 – 5 simultaneous scientific streams covering the full range of domains of anaesthesia, notably including a stream aimed at all those providing anaesthesia services and focusing on the story of anaesthesia in Africa – including opportunities for training, research and co-operation in standardisation and resource sharing across the continent. Many of the Friday workshops will be repeated during the course of AAAC. Other sessions of interest include Global Surgery, theatre efficiency and governance, procedural sedation, transplantation in the African context, and a big emphasis on Wellness. All streams will be available live and virtually in English and French.

Such an extensive and wide-ranging meeting would be impossible without the extraordinary hard work of my local organising committee (LOC) under the wise guidance of Prof Christina Lundgren, with the solid support of SASA (represented by Dr Caroline Corbett and Ms Lezelle Britz) and the ARS of the WFSA (represented by Dr Gareth Davies). Prof Edwin Turton, Dr Joubert Steynberg and Ms Lyanza Jansen (representing pharma) complete the non-scientific component of the LOC. Our scientific committee is led by Prof Palesa Motshabi, Dr Howard Radford and Dr Sithandiwe Dingezweni. The engine driving the entire process is our professional congress organisers, Velocity Vision, under the leadership of Ms Nevi Letcher. 

We invite you with open arms to visit us in Sandton in September 2024 – ideally in person but otherwise online. Please visit this website to follow the evolution of and latest news about our meeting. We will be delighted to interact with you and facilitate your attendance.

Yours in expectation 

Chairman LOC