World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists

At the WCA 2008 I presented the website as it had developed since I took over in 2004. The future objectives that I proposed were as follows.
1.    Offer more languages than the English on the site.
2.    Bring the Anaesthesia Tutorial of the Week and Update in Anaesthesia onto the site.
3.    Plan an exit strategy for myself as the manager of the site.

Increasing the languages offered

This has been achieved. Translation has been added to the site.  The way that this has been achieved is that a user can choose the language with which they wish to view the site. If, for example, they wish to use Spanish, they choose this on the language menu and the result is that if a content item has been translated into Spanish it will appear in Spanish. If it has not it will remain in English so that at least the user may get some meaning from it if not as much as in their first language. The languages offered so far are Spanish, French and Chinese with the occasional article translated into Portuguese although the latter is not a selectable language on the site. I am extremely grateful for the translation that has been done for me. Dr Gonzalo Barreiro, Dr Philippe Scherpereel, Dr Pedro Ibarra, Dr Zhaojing and Dr Hwang Nian Chih. Dr Hwang Nian Chih also runs the pages for the Safety and Quality of Practice Committee. The Front Page and the Education Report have been translated into all the languages. The Constitution has been translated into French and Spanish and there are several other items that are in Spanish and French.

WFSA Education Resources Section

There is a new section on the site, the WFSA Education Resources Section. This is run in a different manner from the rest of the site at the moment and is set up as a second site although a user is not aware of this. The fact that it is a second site has meant an increase in cost, with a setup cost and an additional maintenance fee. The reason to do this was to use a posting page style like a blog page for ease of upload of the articles. The result has not been entirely satisfactory and this is under review. It would be most economic to leave it the way it is but for approximately AU$200 per month we may be able to shift up to a more complex approach that may be more satisfactory. One way this could be achieved would be that the additional fee be paid out of the Publication Budget. This is by no means decided and we need to experiment a bit more with what he have already before abandoning it. The current problems relate to laborious uploading of tables and images, and to lack of flexibility in indexing the articles. These education pages are going to grow into an incredible international resource of knowledge so it is important that we find the best way at the start because it will very difficult to change later.

Online Payment of Subscriptions & Donations

The desire was expressed at the WCA in 2006 that online payment should be offered. This was initially setup using PayPal but never really worked well and constant problems occurred because of not accepting larger payments. Phillip Bridenbaugh suggested the USA Company, PledgeConnect. This is a company whose main function is setting up web portals through which charitable organisations can receive donations. There were initial difficulties because of the complex tax and approval requirements but with a lot of work by Ruth Hooper and the help of Dr Fontenot these were eventually solved.  

Handing over the management of the site

I took over the running of the website at the Paris 2004 WCA and my time on the executive is coming to an end. I have been looking for a suitable person to take over from me and Dr Pedro Ibarra (Colombia) has kindly stepped forward to do so. He has already distinguished himself on the Internet with his webpage on Anaesthesia, http://www.anestesianet.com/ that he personally developed and maintained for six years. It is a great relief to me that the WFSA site will be in such good hands. It suits us both to make the handover in 2012 at the WCA. It will give Dr Ibarra time to become accustomed to the workings of the site and me time to finish what I started so that the WFSA website can be handed over in a more completed state.

The web designer

At the last WCA it was agreed to sign a contract with Mr Tansel Tiknaz of Xpert Web of Australia who has proved to be a most reliable and supportive colleague. He has kept his costs reasonable and realises that the WFSA needs to reserve its funds for its core service of education and publication. He has promptly sorted out problems for both Ruth and me and is currently liaising with Dr Bruce McCormick and Dr Richard Hughes concerning the new section with ATOTW and Update in Anaesthesia. He has also kept the site simple in appearance with quick download speed, which was one of my original requests.

Plan for the next 12 months

• Solve the problems for ATOTW and Update in Anaesthesia
• Continue to translate more of the site.
• Try and get advertising onto the site.
• Assist Dr Ibarra in becoming familiar with the site.
• Ask the Executive Committee to formally recognise that the Web Site Manager should be a member of the Executive Committee. If the Manager is not already present in some other capacity then it will need to be by as a co-opted member.