I am deeply honored and humbled to address you as the President of our esteemed society. I am grateful to my mentors, and colleagues for their support throughout my career.

Pakistan Society for Rheumatology (PSR) established in 1996 is not only the sole representative body of the rheumatology community in Pakistan but also a member of the Asia Pacific League of Associations for Rheumatology.

My journey in rheumatology is spanning over two decades. At the time when I joined PSR, it was a small society of first-generation very passionate rheumatologists extremely eager to establish rheumatology in Pakistan. Their hard work has paved the path for getting rheumatology recognized by regulatory bodies, and accreditation by CPSP as a discipline for fellowship training. Rheumatology as a specialty has made enormous progress in Pakistan in the last two decades.

I always tell my students and fellows that ‘these are great times to be a rheumatologist’ as we have now access to biologics and targeted therapies helping our patients achieve disease remissions. It is very rewarding to bring children, young and old with inflammatory arthritis out of their wheelchairs and save the lives of young people suffering from devastating diseases like lupus. There is still a long way to go in improving access to such effective but expensive treatments for our patients in middle and low-income countries.

Our vision is to foster national and international research collaborations and develop national and regional registries for generating real-world data. Only then we will be able to make our treatment guidelines in our local context.

Young Fellows in training are our best resource and our future leaders. I encourage each of you to actively engage in our society's initiatives, whether through research, continuous medical education, or creating public awareness about rheumatic diseases through social media.

We need to enhance our advocacy efforts at the governmental level to create more opportunities for young rheumatologists to set up departments in all tertiary care and district hospitals across Pakistan.

PSR since its inception has been regularly holding annual conferences with the support of the Pharmaceutical industry which are very well attended by health care professionals featuring national and international faculty. It provides a forum for presenting local research, experience sharing, and networking.

I look forward to working closely with all the esteemed members of PSR and thank you all for your trust in me and continuing unwavering support to the cause.

Let’s join hands together in our fight against rheumatic diseases.

Warm regards,
Prof. Muhammad Ahmed Saeed
MBBS, FRCP, FACP, FACR
FCPS Internal Medicine
FCPS Rheumatology
Professor and Head Department of Rheumatology
Institute of Rheumatic Diseases (IRD)
Central Park Medical College, Lahore
Consultant Rheumatologist, National Hospital and Medical Center
Director and Consultant Rheumatologist, Arthritis Care Centre, Lahore
Co-Chair and Founding Board Member, Arthritis Care Foundation
President Pakistan Society for Rheumatology (PSR)
www.arthritiscare.org.pk
www.arthritiscarecentre.org
www.pakrheumatology.org.pk