Dear Colleagues,

If I see far, it is because I stand on the shoulder of giants. We are all a part of the historic journey begun by Charles Dotter in 1964, and the inheritors of his legacy. The idea of treating pathologies through pinholes under imaging guidance was a fundamental shift in surgical approach, and the reverberations of that historic act in 1964 inspire and energise us to this day.

We have become to an extent , victims of our own success. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then we can pride ourselves that all those who ridiculed our beginnings are now paying us compliments every day! From the time of visualize but do not fix to now, we have seen the organic growth of a vital and transformative specialty that is respected across the board.

With great power comes great responsibility .. and with our shift from diagnosticians to proceduralists to clinicians, comes the responsibility of patient care and interaction with the patient at every stage. This is a choice that has been made for us by the nature of our task, if we want respect as clinicians and the power to transform lives with our interventions, we must hold paramount the duty of interacting with the patient at every stage of the clinical pathway. We must see, touch and communicate with our patients at every available opportunity. This ancient and sacred bond between the healer and the sick is one that we must nurture and make the cornerstone of our practice. Fail this test, and we will be doomed to recede and die as a specialty.