The annual World Medical Association (WMA) General Assembly will be held in Chicago, the USA, at the Renaissance Chicago Downtown Hotel, 11-14 October, 2017.

Stepan Firstov visit the event as an WMA Associate Member and as one of the ideologists of the movement of medical Self-Regulation in Russia. A doctor form Chelyabinsk will take part at the annual assemblies of the World Medical Parliament for the fourth time. In 2014 he visited the 65th the WMA General Assembly in Durban (the Republic of South Africa) and in 2015 he visited the same event in Moscow. The 67th General Assembly was held in Taipei (Taiwan) in 2016. In 2017 considering voting results, representatives of the medical community from all about the world will meet in Chicago.

Russia was not a member of the World Medical Association for a long time, even after collapse of the iron curtain. The reason is that a physician in Russia does not possess a legal personality and a leader of medical association, where a physician works, is responsible for all actions of physician. This situation as well as situation that professional medical communities of doctors of one specialisation do not have any admission to the profession is a nonsense for the whole civilized world.

Stepan Firstov says: «To become a delegate of the World Medical Association Annual General Assembly means for me a unique opportunity to direct communication with foreign colleges, to know how the medical community of different countries works and how physicians solve organizational and professional problems. «

The Chicago Assembly program includes sessions of several committees. The main session is also planned named this year Quality assurance of the basic medical education as well as the ceremony where doctor, Yoshitake Yokokura, president of the Japan Medical Association, will officially take office of the WMA president for 2017/18.

Questions on topics of revision of the physiologists' Oath, the problem of the use of marijuana in medicine, revision of recommendations to doctors constraining to feed starving people, problem of violence in medical institutions, measures to improve medical care in air, and many others will be discussed at the General Assembly in Chicago.

For your information.

The interest sphere of the World Medical Association includes:

— protection of the basic rights of patients and doctors

— medical education (assistance in continuous improvement in medicine and provision of medical services),

— study of the human capacity of health services,

— patient safety issues,

— health protection (including projects such as tobacco control and vaccination),

— training of managers in the field of health,

— health and safety.