On the 3rd of September 1999 the 4th conference of the middle east group for spine was held in Amman–Jordan. It was decided in that conference to transform this society into the Pan Arab Spine Society and for this purpose the main regulations were suggested at the attendance of the deceased Dr.Hassan Khrais the secretary general of the Union of Arab Doctors and a foundation council was elected at the presidency of Dr.Ziad Mohammad Zoobi from Jordan.

This council, through the great efforts by Dr.Abdulfattah Bo Shalla has made possible the holding of the 1st conference of Pan Arab Spine Society in Tripoli–Libya in September 2000 at the presence of the secretary general of the Union of Arab Doctors.In this conference the main rules and regulations of the society and the organizational architecture were approved.

The most important goals of the society are achieving communication among the spine doctors and surgeons all over the Arab world, training young doctors and founding permanent relations with Arab doctors in the overseas countries.
All this will be achieved through holding of annual conferences in Arab capitals and spreading consciousness in the fields of spine surgery in these countries.

In the 1st conference the general secretariat was elected which consists of secretary general, deputy of the secretary general and 3 assistants. The general secretariat followed up the society affairs and its period were renewed in 2003.

The society held 6 scientific conferences in the past years. After the 1st conference in Tripoli, the 2nd conference was held in Horghada in Egypt, the 3rd conference was held in Amman in 2003, the 4th conference held in Aleppo/Syria in 2006, the 5th conference was held in Tunisia in 2007& the 6thconference was held in Sana–Yemen in 2008 and here you are meeting in Cairo of Al-mouez in 2009.
 
The main rules and regulations of the  society state that it’s society which includes the societies of spine in Arab countries and members of countries which don’t have societies. Although the society has proved itself as a reality by its conferences and relations with international societies, there still some insufficiencies which we should admit with in several aspects and some of these aspects are related with the political, economic and social conditions of the Arab world and some others are related with financial situation of the society and other aspects are out of control of everybody.

The most important achievements during the march of the society was these relations among the spine surgeons and among them and other doctors of other disciplines related with spine such as neural surgery, orthopedic surgery, medical rehabilitation, pain therapy and anesthesia. The most difficulties encountered by the society wert that the spine discipline is a new specialty and there was no enthusiasm by other disciplines to raise it and establishing new societies for it as in the developed countries.
The societies faced many challenges the most of important of which were the financial resources because the society was relying on itself, The major companies have established their special major corporations which used them to market their products and hold annual conferences with entire costs paid generously by these companies or their agents in the Arab countries which made these companies hesitating in supporting the conferences of the society.
Additionally the personality in relation with the society came through convergence or crossing of personal relations and this is the case not only for the spine society by for most Arab medical societies and the spine society were the most active and most organized society in spite of its recent foundation.

The Arab medical societies were exposed to for its mutual Arabic activities and efforts and there are many destructive efforts which we try to avoid and we have a plenty of hope to have the support by all sincere people eager for Arab mutual work and solidarity to maintain this society and pushing its march ahead in order to continue powerfully For this reason I would like to suggest the following:
1 - Establishing a base for individual membership in addition to national societies.
2 - intensifying the holding of small workshops.
3 - Finding a facility for training young doctors and continuing in the attempts for the establishment of Arab fellowship for spine.
4 - Issuing a specialist journal for the publication of spine researches in the Arab world.
5 - Strengthening the relations with pan Arab spine doctors and surgeons.
6 - Strengthening the relations with international spine societies and holding common  conferences with them for finding training and working  opportunities for young spine surgeons in European and America countries.

we were able during the last 10 years to establish and make firm the pan Arab spine society, to spread the consciousness for this discipline, to train some doctors  and to establish tight relations with international societies.
Each one knew the other and this had an excellent efficiency for our patients and our nations.
The most recent achievement was the dedication of special issue of the European spine research journal for the spine medicine in the Arab world.

This is a brief summary about the idea of  establishing the society and hope that everybody contributes in the dialogue about e-mails or oral conversations about the means of developing the society.

Dr.Ziad Zoobi