Dear Respected Members of the Korean Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons,

I am very pleased to inform you that we are going to hold PRS KOREA 2023 (the 81th Congress of the Korean Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons), and to invite you to this conference.

PRS KOREA 2023 will take place at the Grand Intercontinental Seoul Parnas in Seoul, Korea for three days from November 10 to 12, 2023, and “Revitalizing the Legacy, Illuminating the Horizon” has been adopted as the theme of the conference.

PRS KOREA is an annual academic conference organized by the Korean Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons, and it has been successfully held as an international conference since 2011. It is the largest-scale international academic conference on plastic surgery in Asian regions as a representative scientific meeting in medicine in Asia.
Last year, more than 1500 plastic surgeons attended PRS KOREA 2022, and not only domestic surgeons but also more than 450 surgeons from over 30 foreign countries participated in the conference, clearly demonstrating the status of PRS KOREA as an established international academic conference.

Especially, now that COVID-19 restrictions have been completely removed, PRS KOREA 2023 is expected to be a vibrant academic event attended by a much larger number of domestic and foreign plastic surgeons. In particular, this conference is expected to give participants opportunities to have active academic exchanges through the participation of a much larger number of domestic plastic surgeons as well as those from many foreign countries, including eight nations that have an MOU for academic interactions with Korea.
This year, we have prepared a conference program enriched by the inclusion of more diverse and in-depth sessions through the joint participation of the following five affiliated societies: the Korean Cleft Palate-Craniofacial Association, the Asian Blepharoplasty Forum 2023, the Korean Botox-Filler-Thread Lift Society, the Korean Academic Association of Plastic Surgery Research, and the Korean Academic Association of Facial Trauma Surgeons

PRS KOREA 2023 will present the speeches and lectures of world-renowned guest speakers. Among this year’s prominent guest speakers, Dr. W. P. Andrew Lee, who is the dean of UT Southwestern Medical School and an authority in the field of allogenic transplantation, will deliver a keynote speech. In addition, high-quality lectures will be offered by preeminent surgeons such as Dr. Kevin C. Chung at University of Michigan and Dr. Geoffrey C. Gurtner at University of Arizona.
Dr. Kevin C. Chung is an authority in the field of hand surgery and is currently serving as the editor-in-chief of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, the official journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, and Dr. Geoffrey C. Gurtner is an esteemed researcher who has accomplished numerous achievements in basic plastic surgery research and is an authority on scars and wound healing. In addition, through the participation of about 100 foreign speakers and more than 100 sessions, this conference will provide a venue for in-depth discussions on topics encompassing various areas in plastic surgery.

Although there has been very rapid development in the field of plastic surgery over the past several decades, we are currently facing many internal and external challenges. In particular, we need to overcome problems such as the continuous intrusion by other medical fields into the areas of plastic surgery in both reconstructive and cosmetic surgery, the chronic problem of the distorted social images of plastic surgery, a lack of smooth academic communication and exchanges between university hospitals and private practitioners, and delays in digital transition in the digital era. In view of this situation, it should be one of our first priorities for this period to discover and preoccupy new disease groups in consideration of the needs of an aging and advanced society, and expand the scope of plastic surgery to various body parts.
Thus, we have tried to reflect these considerations in the composition of the conference program of PRS KOREA 2023. As a result, this year’s conference program includes newly added sessions on various disease groups including skin cancer in addition to existing disease groups. In an attempt to adapt to changes resulting from the Fourth Industrial Revolution, we have also prepared a session for actively and boldly introducing translational medicine into the field of plastic surgery as well as the convergence research session in relation to the fields of cutting-edge regenerative medicine, medical devices, tissue engineering, and digital therapeutics.
The conference program also includes the High Impact presentation session to strengthen free presentations and sessions to present cutting-edge knowledge in cosmetic surgery considering that Korea is a powerhouse in cosmetic surgery globally recognized around the world beyond Asia. In other words, this year’s conference program is composed of various useful sessions with the aims of the expansion of the scope of research and the promotion of in-depth explorations in plastic and reconstructive surgery, which are considered the most important tasks of this era in this field of medicine

Through the conference program covering diverse topics and active academic exchanges, PRS KOREA 2023 will hopefully serve as a turning point for overcoming our present crises and presenting a blueprint for a bright future in the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery, and this conference will lay the groundwork for our cooperative endeavors to appropriately accomplish our mission of this era that may be described as “building a brilliant future through the great past and efforts to overcome the present crises.”

I hope that all the attendees will have pleasant and useful experiences through active participation and communications at PRS Korea 2023.

Hak Chang, M.D., Ph.D
President of Korean Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons