The Society of Asian Academic Surgeons (SAAS) was founded to focus on the personal and professional development of Asian academic surgeons with the belief that the best way to increase Asian representation in the leadership of academic surgery is to prepare future generations to succeed.
Towards this end, we raise money to provide scholarships for both trainees and junior faculty to help them with their career development. We also give out awards for the best research submitted by members to the Academic Surgical Congress and to the SAAS Annual Meeting to showcase the advances being made by Asians in the field.
From the beginning, our society has been fully inclusive. We defined “Asian” in the broadest sense to include not only those from East, Southeast, and South Asia, but also Persians, Arabs, Turks and any other nationality from the Asian continent. Furthermore, membership in SAAS is open to anyone of any ethnicity who has an interest in promoting underrepresented populations in any arena of academic surgery.