The American Association of Swine Veterinarians (AASV) held its 45th Annual Meeting in Dallas, TX. March 1 - 4, 2014. The meeting, held at the Sheraton Dallas Hotel, drew 1046 total attendees including 612 paid registrants and 133 students. The participants represented 25 countries with 22% of attendees from outside the U.S. Total attendance included 235 allied industry representatives from 81 exhibitors manning a record 82 technical tables. The students in attendance represented 21 veterinary schools!
The participants were presented with numerous educational sessions including 10 pre-conference workshops, two general sessions, three break-out sessions, research topics, industrial partner sessions, 15 student seminar presentations and 95 posters.
Dr. Daryl Olsen opened the Monday General Session with the Howard Dunne Memorial Lecture. His presentation, entitled “The pig always wins,” reminds us that we as veterinarians took an oath to speak for the pig. He concluded by saying, “If we practice scientific, ethical veterinary medicine, based on our Veterinarian’s Oath, then the pig will always win.” Dr. Mark Engle followed up with the Alex Hogg Memorial Lecture entitled “The PED challenge: Application of our veterinary oath to represent the interest of the pig.”
The second half of the Monday morning session included presentations on PRRS, swine influenza, mycoplasma, enteric disease and animal welfare. Trent Loos started off the Tuesday morning session challenging us to become “agvocates” for our profession and the swine industry. The remainder of the Tuesday session focused on the impact of the introduction of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus into the North American swine herd. All of the General Session presentations on Monday and Tuesday were video recorded and will be posted in the video library of the AASV website in the near future.