The Harold Griffith Lecture
The Harold Griffith Lecture is the keynote address of the World Congress of Anaesthesiologists and the only named plenary in the WCA scientific programme. It is named after Dr Harold Griffith of Canada, the first President of WFSA, who presided over the inaugural World Congress of Anaesthesiologists in Scheveningen, Netherlands, in 1955.
Each Congress, WFSA recognises an individual or individuals whose work has made a significant and lasting contribution to anaesthesiology, patient safety, education, or global health. The lecture highlights leadership and innovation that have shaped the specialty and continue to influence practice worldwide.
The lecture provides a moment for the international anaesthesiology community to reflect on progress in the field and to engage with emerging ideas and challenges shaping the future of perioperative and global anaesthesia care.
The Harold Griffith Lecturer for WCA2028 will be announced this autumn.
WCA2026 — Marrakech, Morocco
Professor Adrian W. Gelb
Can Anaesthesiologists Lead on Patient Safety Again?
The introduction of anaesthesia revolutionised surgery, but it remained inherently dangerous until 30–40 years ago. Anaesthesiologists demonstrated that safety standards and technology could save lives, setting in motion a trend that reshaped patient care across all of medicine. Yet those dramatic gains have largely plateaued. Standards and guidelines continue to multiply, but are commonly poorly implemented — leading clinicians to bypass or work around them. The challenge before us is addressing standards designed for work as imagined, rather than work as done.
Professor Gelb’s lecture explored patient safety from the macro level of national systems and policy down to the micro level of the operating room, presenting practical tools and approaches to integrate standards more effectively into everyday clinical care.
About Professor Gelb: Distinguished Professor (Emeritus) at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and a Past President of WFSA (2020–2022), Professor Gelb has worked extensively with WHO and international partners to expand access to safe anaesthesiology worldwide.
Over a career spanning multiple continents, he has authored more than 400 publications and delivered over 400 invited lectures, including 19 named lectureships. He is a recipient of the Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society Gold Medal and the American Society of Anesthesiologists Award for Humanitarian Contributions.
WCA2024 — Singapore
Dr Jannicke Mellin-Olsen & Professor Kevin Fong
In 2024, the Harold Griffith Lecture honour was shared by two internationally renowned anaesthesiologists who delivered complementary perspectives on improving patient care. Dr Mellin-Olsen, drawing on her own experience as a patient, spoke about adopting a more patient-centred approach to safety. Professor Fong drew on his work with NASA and the aerospace industry to explore how risk is understood and mitigated — and what anaesthesiology can learn from it. The lecture was delivered to a standing ovation from an audience of more than 1,700.
About Dr Mellin-Olsen: A Norwegian anaesthesiologist and global leader in patient safety, Dr Mellin-Olsen served as WFSA President from 2018 to 2020 and co-authored the 2010 Helsinki Declaration on Patient Safety in Anaesthesiology. Over more than 40 years she held leadership roles across the Norwegian Society of Anaesthesiology, the European Board of Anaesthesiology, and the European Patient Safety Foundation, and was honoured with Norway’s Knight 1st Class of the Royal Order of St Olav.
We remember Dr Mellin-Olsen with great respect; she passed away in February 2025, leaving a lasting legacy in global anaesthesiology and patient safety.
About Professor Fong: A consultant anaesthetist at University College London Hospitals (UCLH) and professor of public engagement and innovation at UCL, Professor Fong is dually accredited in anaesthesiology and critical care medicine. He has worked with NASA’s Human Adaptation and Countermeasures Office on the physiology of spaceflight, and is known to broader audiences through his BBC science broadcasting, including the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures. In 2020 he was seconded to NHS England as National Clinical Advisor for the COVID-19 response.
WCA2020 — Prague (Virtual Congress)
Professor Christina Maslach and Dr Edna Adan Ismail
Marking the International Year of Health and Care Workers, Professor Maslach spoke on workforce burnout in Reinventing the Workplace, and Dr Adan Ismail spoke on Transforming Healthcare in Somaliland.
Professor Maslach is the social psychologist behind the Maslach Burnout Inventory, the world’s most widely used measure of occupational burnout. Dr Adan Ismail is a Somaliland nurse-midwife who founded the Edna Adan University Hospital in Hargeisa and served as Somaliland’s first female Foreign Minister.
WCA2016 — Hong Kong
Dr Atul Gawande & Tore Laerdal
Two speakers from very different backgrounds shared personal stories of how their upbringing shaped their understanding of anaesthesiology and global health.
Dr Gawande is a surgeon, Harvard professor, and bestselling author (Being Mortal, Complications) known for his work on the global gap in access to safe surgical and anaesthesiology care. Tore Laerdal is CEO of Laerdal Medical, the Norwegian company behind the world’s first CPR training manikin, and a longstanding champion of global resuscitation training.
The Harold Griffith Lecture continues to set the tone for each Congress — a moment where the anaesthesiology community looks to the bigger questions facing patient care worldwide.