June 16, 2011 β More than 5,500 physicians, technologists, physicists, scientists and exhibitors gathered last week at the Society of Nuclear Medicine's (SNM) 2011 annual meeting, held June 4-8 in San Antonio, Texas. In addition to the more than 70 continuing education sessions, 1,818 scientific papers and posters were presented at the meeting and 165 companies were represented on the exhibit hall floor.
The annual meeting opened with the SNM plenary session on Sunday, June 5, as Bruce R. Rosen, M.D., Ph.D., professor of radiology at Harvard Medical School, delivered the Henry N. Wagner Jr. Lectureship. His presentation, "PET and MRI: A Match Made in Heaven or the Odd Couple?" examined both the potential and pitfalls of combined studies using positron emission tomography (PET) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
In addition, two esteemed SNM awards were presented at the opening plenary session. Sanjiv "Sam" Gambhir, M.D., Ph.D., professor of radiology and chairman-designate at Stanford University School of Medicine, received the Georg Charles de Hevesy Nuclear Pioneer Award for his contributions to the nuclear medicine profession. Markus Schwaiger, M.D., director of nuclear medicine at Klinikum Rechts der Isar of Technical University of Munich in Germany, received the Paul C. Aebersold Award for outstanding achievement in basic science applied to nuclear medicine.
Monday's special plenary session welcomed in a new leadership team for SNM as George Segall, M.D., took the helm as the society's 2011-2012 president. Frederic H. Fahey, DSc, and Gary Dillehay, M.D., assumed their roles as president-elect and vice president-elect, respectively. Also at this session, the Hal Anger Lectureship, entitled "Progress in Time-of-Flight PET by Fits and Starts," was presented by Joel S. Karp, Ph.D., professor of radiology at the University of Pennsylvania.
The 2011 annual meeting concluded on Wednesday, June 8, with an overview of the research presented throughout the sessions. Groundbreaking advances were demonstrated in many areas, including cardiology, oncology, neurology and general nuclear medicine. The 2011 Image of the Year, which illustrates the ability of positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT) scans to identify abnormal bone reaction in patients who have received spinal fixation hardware implants, was also presented at this session.
For the first time, SNM has developed a virtual meeting for those unable to attend certain sessions or make the trip to San Antonio. The virtual meeting captured 70 sessions β including 35 continuing education sessions, 20 technologist sessions and 15 scientific sessions β which are now available at www.snm.org/virtualmeeting. The 2012 SNM annual meeting will take place June 9-13 in Miami, Fla.
For more information: www.snm.org.
April 22, 2024 
