This last month has been a whirlwind of work. Beside my regular stream of work with the Western University College of Podiatric Medicine, I have been fortunate enough to be asked to speak at three different upcoming conferences. As much of an honor as it is to be asked to lecture, it also adds an inordinate amount of work to an already busy schedule, as I’m sure many of you who speak in various venues are aware. My first conference coming up is the Western Scientific Conference in Disneyland, and I hope to see many of you there. It’s a very good conference and blessedly local!

Considering I’ve been spending so much of my time preparing for these upcoming conferences, I figured I would reflect on some of the lessons I’ve learned – before even speaking at the actual conferences! It’s amazing how much we learn when thrown into the fire.

And that is my FIRST LESSON: Don’t say “no” to offers. It would have been easy for me to tell myself that the Western is one of the largest conferences in the country and who am I to speak? I could have come up with any number of other excuses not to attend: I’m too busy, I can’t stop clinical practice, etc. Despite all the potential excuses – and the fact that I’m pretty nervous about this event – I stand to personally gain from the experience I will receive from participating. This is useful for advancement at my job, but more importantly, this is a unique experience that has been a limited aspect of my career thus far. So, despite how nerve-wracking the new and unknown can be, I suggest taking the dive.

SECOND LESSON: Time management is key! I was asked to give a total of eight lectures at three conferences over a five-month period between June and October. As I’m sure everyone in our field knows, preparing PowerPoints is a labor-intensive activity, especially when we speak on a new topic. Also, as someone who doesn’t like to drop my responsibilities on my residents or students, I’m preparing these lectures myself. As a result, scheduling the time to do the research and preparation necessary is a must. My best suggestions are to not procrastinate and just make a start. Starting is the hardest part. Also, break up big jobs into smaller manageable pieces. It’s much less overwhelming that way. I attempted to do this at first, but didn’t schedule enough time and had to put in a bunch of late nights as it has gotten closer to the conference. Unfortunately, our other responsibilities must also be attended to, and we can’t just stop everything to prepare for those big jobs.

THIRD LESSON: It’s interesting to find out what you don’t know when you perform a comprehensive examination of a subject. Taking the time to research a topic fully, rather than the typical fast read-through of a journal article, elicits previously unknown information. One of the lectures I’m giving is on hallux varus. Now, I’ll be honest here (as I will during the conference) and tell you I very rarely treat this disorder. Luckily I haven’t caused hallux varus (as far as I know), and very few of my colleagues do. Outside of the rare non-iatrogenic hallux varus, I just don't see it often. As a result, I had to go back to the literature and educate myself a good deal more than most topics. My opinion has generally been to offer a great toe joint arthrodesis because most of my experiences with hallux varus have been with patients who had more than one attempted joint preservation procedure that failed miserably and would have been better off with a fusion. However, after dissecting the literature, it turns out there are almost zero studies on fusion for hallux varus. Most of the literature has revolved around joint sparing, and the literature itself is weak. Had I not taken the time to review the literature for the presentation, I would be uneducated. We still have poor evidence to make recommendations for our patients, but at least I’m more aware of that fact.

FOURTH LESSON: Don’t be afraid of the unknown. Events are usually worse in our preconceptions than they are in reality. I’ve already experienced over 100 various scenarios in my mind in which I completely blow all of these lectures at Western Conference. I’m sure my mental scenarios are much worse than the reality will be, despite the fact that my first lecture is hypothetical and perhaps a little heretical. If you want to hear more about that, come to the Western and watch me get destroyed by the podiatry community!

New experiences are always rich in learning experiences, and I’m sure my Western Conference experience will be chock full of learning. I hope to see you all there. I also hope to see you at the upcoming PRESENT Podiatric Residency Education Summit Midwest!