2016 Presidential Recognition Award:
Dr. David V. Leaming

Dr. David Leaming graduated from the University of Nebraska College of Medicine and after nine years in the Army, which included his residency at Tripler Army Medical Center, he settled into the private practice of Ophthalmology in Palm Springs, California where he still maintains an active surgical practice. In 1984, he surveyed the attendees of the AIOIS (American Intraocular Implant Society) in Los Angeles as to their practice styles and preferences. Since then has has performed an annual practice style survey of AIOIS/ASCRS members and presented the results annually till 2012 (28 years). He was asked and started performing the annual practice style survey for the ESCRS (European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery) members in 1998 and has annually reported the results back at the yearly ESCRS meetings until 2013. 

He teamed up with Dr. Richard Duffey in 1997 to strengthen the refractive portion of the surveys and helped Dr. Duffey with his ISRS member survey that he has been reporting annually at the ISRS meetings ending with last year's 2015 report. He was presented with the ASCRS's Special Recognition Award in 2004 for his work. His main reason for doing the surveys was to provide a benchmark of current practice styles so that he and his colleagues could get a more balanced comparison of what trends were real and later to compare what was going on internationally with the US practice styles.