Association for Academic Surgery Presidential Address: Interwoven Missions Empowering All Academic Surgeons.

This 2026 Presidential Address for the Association for Academic Surgery was delivered on February 4, 2026. It addresses the topic of understanding the value that academic surgeons create across the missions of clinical care, research, and education, as well as how the clinical mission has become outsized in many academic medical centers. The analogy of braided suture is used to demonstrate the essential and interconnected nature of the three academic missions, and the address concludes through exploration of models to better measure academic contributions apart from clinical care.