2026 Annual Scientific Meeting

Submission Deadline is 11:59 pm PT on Wednesday, September 3, 2025!

The Program Committee of the Southern California Chapter, American College of Surgeons, invites your participation in the 2026 Annual Scientific Meeting at The Ritz-Carlton Bacara in Santa Barbara, CA, January 9-11, 2026. You are invited to submit an abstract on the clinical or laboratory research project of your choice.

Abstracts may be submitted for Plenary or Mini-Podium presentations or to be considered for Specialty sessions. This selection should be done as part of the submission process.

Abstracts may not have been submitted to a journal for publication, published previously, or presented at a national or regional meeting prior to the 2026 Chapter meeting. Simultaneous submission of an abstract to the SCCACS and any other organization or publication is prohibited and will be cause for abstract rejection without consideration. Abstracts are only accepted through the online submission form and must conform to the Instructions for Preparation of Abstract!

CASE PRESENTATIONS will NOT be considered!

Publication: To encourage consideration of submission of your best work for the SCCACS meeting, publication in the American Surgeon is encouraged, but not required for accepted plenary abstracts. Manuscripts for abstracts accepted for mini-podium presentation or specialty sessions will also be considered for publication. All submissions will require a pre-review by the SCCACS Review Committee for feedback to help improve chances of publication acceptance. You should indicate on the abstract submission form whether the submission is to be considered for publication in the American Surgeon.*

Abstract Submission Guidelines

• Abstracts must conform to the exact size and format specified in the Abstract Preparation Instructions.
• All figures, tables, and images must be included within the abstract in the specified abstract format (no separate pages)
• Do not use any special characters within your abstract submission.
• Authors are required to submit two multiple choice questions with abstract submission for Self-Assessment Quiz and MOC Credit planning for the 2026 Annual Meeting.

MOC/Self-Assessment Credit 

For abstracts submitted for Plenary or Mini-podium presentation for the 2026 Meeting, 2 questions/answers for MOC/SELF ASSESSMENT CREDIT must also be submitted at the time of abstract submission. NOTE: Of the 2 questions you submit, 1 MUST be a clinical case situation.

Question Writing Guidelines

For tips on writing well-constructed questions for self-assessment quizzes, use the link below to a resource for question writing guidelines. Note that questions should only be multiple choice (not true/false) and should not contain answer options such as “all of the above” or “none of the above.”

The SCCACS sponsors 3 competitions associated with abstract/manuscript submissions.