From the Editor-in-Chief

Welcome to the latest edition of the MEJEM. Things are very exciting at the moment as weare preparing for the 2nd Qatar International Trauma Care, Disaster and Emergency Medicine Conference on the 7th - 11th April, 2004, in Doha. The first meeting was so successful that we decided that it was too important an event not to organise again.  It is our hope that many of our readers will be able to attend the conference and benefit from the wealth of knowledge and expertise on display.  Conferences are always an excellent opportunity to make new friends and professional contacts. We are expecting over thousand  and five hundred delegates, so it is likely to be a very lively occasion.  There are a host of international speakers from countries both near and far, so the range of knowledge and the exchange of ideas will be excellent.  For those of you who are reading this at the conference - Welcome!  

For those who canÕt make it, we hope to bring you the best of the conference in the forth-coming issues. On a somewhat different note, April 7th has been nominated by the World Health Organisation as ÒRoad SafetyÓ day.  They are aiming to highlight the dangers faced by both pedestrians and motorists, and to remind people of the very simple measures that can make such a difference for those involved in motor related accidents.  In keeping with this event, the MEJEM has two relevant articles included in this issue.  Each article raises very important points on road safety, the first in relation to wearing seatbelts, and the second with visual acuity.  Both of these are areas that many members of the public feel are not very important, yet both contribute significantly to loss of life and morbidity.

                
Dr. Abdul Wahab Al Mulseh, MD, FRCS (I), CABS
Editor-in-Chief