Looking back to look ahead

Dr Kathryn Kell

FDI President

Planning for the future

At the FDI Mid-Year Meeting, FDI Council and Committees tackled a jam-packed agenda reviewing and presenting FDI activities to improve oral health worldwide. We are now almost half-way through FDI’s four-year (2018-2021) strategic plan, so now is the time to accelerate our efforts.

I was impressed to hear so many projects and resources being developed by FDI Committees, which will be presented to the FDI General Assembly at the 2019 FDI World Dental Congress (WDC) this September. We also learned of the excellent worldwide engagement from our members with the 2019 World Oral Health Day campaign, Say Ahh: Act on Mouth Health. Another key topic intensely discussed at the meeting was the work of the Vision 2030 Working Group that is tasked with defining priorities for the oral health profession over the next 10 years (2020-2030), more details on this will be presented at the 2019 FDI WDC.

After a busy week, we all enjoyed a cocktail reception provided for by the Swiss Dental Association and finished off the week with a terrific tour of Geneva. It was interesting for FDI Council and Committees to finally hear about the history of Geneva, the city where so many health organizations including FDI are located.

Returning to Moscow

After Geneva, I headed to Moscow, Russia for the Russian Dental Association (RDA) meeting. This was a very exciting meeting for me – 30 years ago I was part of the American Dental Association’s delegation that was invited by the RDA for a meeting in 1990. The year 1990 was an exciting time in Russia and I was very anxious to see all the changes that had occurred since then. There have been many changes everywhere in the world over the last 30 years. We didn’t even have cell phones back then, but the one thing that didn’t change is the warmth and kind greetings we received from our Russian colleagues.

It was an amazing meeting in 1990 and now in 2019 Prof. Dmitri Trunin, RDA President, invited me to return to Moscow. This time, I attended many thought-provoking events, including meetings at Russia’s Central Research Institute of Dental and Maxillofacial Surgery. Thirty years ago, the Russians demonstrated great surgical advances in maxillofacial and plastic surgery procedures, and I learned that they are still developing new techniques.

While in Moscow, I participated in the Second Medical Forum organized by the Russian State Duma Health Committee. The State Duma is the Russian parliament’s lower house. I met with State Duma Deputy Anatoly Karpov, who at one time was the number one chess player in the world, and I also took part in a meeting with representatives from the State Duma Committee for Healthcare and Moscow State University of Medicine and Dentistry.

Dr Kathryn Kell

FDI President