2024 in review: South African Metabolic Medicine and Surgery Society (SAMMSS)
The South African Metabolic Medicine and Surgery Society was started with the aim to fill the void of a home for members of the multidisciplinary team managing obesity in South Africa.
Below are a few highlights from the SAMMSS 2024 President's Report. You can download and read the full report below.
On 23 June 2021 our first SAMMSS meeting took place where the first EXCO was elected and Healthman appointed for administrative support soon after. This was followed by establishing our constitution and MOI (memorandum of understanding) and in June 2023 SAMMSS was officially registered as an NPC (Non-Profit Company) with 6 board members. We have rapidly grown since to currently have 147 members.
Various valuable affiliations have been established with key organisations.
In June of 2023 SAMMSS published its first position statement on indications for metabolic-bariatric surgery, also shared with health insurers.
Most of our time and energy currently is going into finishing the first ever South African Obesity Guidelines, spearheaded by Wayne May and Marli Conradie-Smit, a formidable team, and we hope to finalise the Guidelines beginning 2025 to be presented at both SASES and SEMDSA Congresses
in 2025.
We had a strong presence at the 2023 and 2024 SASES Congresses and aspire to announce the South African Obesity Guidelines at the 2025 SEMDSA and SASES Congresses.