• Vascular Specialist Newspaper
• Volume 5 - 2009
• Number 9 online
• Number 8
• Number 7 online
• Number 6
• Number 5 Online
• Number 4 online
• Number 3
• Number 2
• Number 12 online
• Number 1
• Volume 4 - 2008
• Number 6
• Number 5
• Number 4
• Number 3
• Number 2
• Number 1
• Volume 3 - 2007
• Number 6
• Number 5
• Number 4
• Number 3
• Number 2
• Number 1
• Volume 2 - 2006
• Number 6
• Number 5
• Number 4
• Number 3
• Number 2
• Number 1
• Volume 1 - 2005
• Number 2
• Number 1

The SVS Lifetime Achievement Award is the highest honor that the Society bestows on a member. The individual selected for this honor is recognized for the outstanding and sustained contributions made to the profession and to the SVS, as well as for exemplary professional practice and leadership.

This year’s distinguished winner is K. Wayne Johnston, MD, who truly fulfills all the criteria for the award and more. Upon receiving his award, Dr. Johnston expressed his gratitude and his thanks to all of the other volunteers in the audience.

“It has been an honor to work with you. You have exhibited enthusiasm, dedication, and sacrifice. You have recognized that critical differences are made by individuals who work together unselfishly.

“By banding together to tackle common problems, you have made significant contributions to our specialty and the SVS. By getting involved at institutional, local, regional, national, or international levels, you have advanced our cause in numerous areas from reimbursement to standards for patient care. The reward of Volunteer Service has been expressed in an epitaph. ‘What I spent is gone. What I kept is lost. What I gave (working for others) will be mine forever,’ ” Dr. Johnston stated.

Candidates for the SVS Lifetime Achievement Award are individuals who have exhibited outstanding leadership within the specialty and who possess exceptional personal integrity and highest standards. The specific requirements considered in evaluating nominees include significant contributions to the SVS and other vascular societies, including leadership that has influenced standards and professional practice demonstrated by nominees who have been president or held another major leadership position in a regional or national vascular specialty society, or the SVS; contributions to vascular education; contributions to vascular basic science or clinical research; service as an active and productive clinical surgeon; special contributions to the field; publications; and any other honors received or any extramural activities that further the goals of the SVS and the profession.

Dr. Johnston was a co-founding member of the Canadian Society for Vascular Surgery and was its President in 1998. He was deeply involved with the precursors of the current Society for Vascular Surgery. He played an active role in committees of the International Cardiovascular Society and the SVS and was actively involved in the negotiations to merge the two societies, especially in setting up the Distinguished Fellows component of the SVS. Between 2003 and 2005 he served as Chair of the Distinguished Fellows Council. He was section editor for the SVS Web site between 2003 and 2006, and was the founding editor of Vascular Specialist, the official SVS newspaper. In 2005 he became Vice President of the SVS and then served as SVS President between 2007 and 2008.

Dr. Johnston was also Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Vascular Surgery and served on the editorial board of several other professional journals.

In the realm of vascular education, he was instrumental in setting initial standards for training in vascular surgery in Canada. He has personally supervised 38 master’s and PhD students, and his research has been continuously funded by the Canadian Institute for Health Research for over 30 years. He was the cofounder and main data analyst for the landmark Canadian aneurysm study, which has had a profound impact on the practice of aneurysm surgery around the world, and has at least 318 peer-reviewed manuscripts.

In one of his most recent major contributions, Dr. Johnston is the Co-Editor with Jack Cronenwett, MD, of the latest edition of the Rutherford textbook on vascular surgery.