President's Report

Dale Comrie BAppSc(Chiro).

COCA aims to provide outstanding service to our members and to help keep chiropractic & osteopathic professionals up to date by providing access to the latest in international research and developments. We currently have an exciting opportunity to undertaken a restructure of our organization with an increased focus on service provision to our membership.

Our stated goals for 2008 are to:

1. Enhance our focus on membership service provision.
2. Provide more of our core objectives (e.g. seminars).
3. Provide greater professional representation on behalf of our members
4. Further our commitment to promote and support student leadership
5. Launch a more user friendly and interactive web site.
6. Expand our member benefits to immediately and more directly benefit your practice.

At present we believe that COCA membership offers exceptional value however we are continuously working to improve our services for members and ensuring you always receive value for your membership. By joining COCA you can participate in the growing reputation and influence of this professional membership body in representing the chiropractic and osteopathic professions. Some benefits of COCA membership are:

• AON Professional Insurance – our insurance agreement provides competition in the marketplace and compares very favourably. The agreement is annually reviewed and refined, such that now covers our members that practice dry needling or acupuncture and over the counter medication prescription.
• Our COCA journal Chiropractic & Osteopathy – is a fully online journal hosted by BioMed Central, and is fast receiving recognition as a high quality journal for musculoskeletal medicine.
• RACGP Library access – the library provides online access to all members, to a vast range of journals (including JMPT), that can be invaluable to those wanting to remain up-to-date with evidence-based information and don’t have access to university libraries.
• COCA Seminars and Distance Education – with the trend at State Board level for compulsory Continuing Professional Development (CPD), all Chiropractors and Osteopaths will need to find ways to attain CPD points to maintain their registration. COCA provides discounted seminars to members and also distance education to allow points to be attained in the comfort of your armchair.

I am pleased to advise the appointment of Rodney Kreymborg to the newly created position of General Manger. Rodney brings a wealth of experience in business management, and customer service; combined with the skills of Melanie Gibson, Marketing Manager and Kristine Riekstins, Office Coordinator I am extremely confident in COCA’s new direction. We believe our new team will successfully deliver exceptional service provision, improved member benefits, excellence in continuing education and online service expansion.

Feel free to contact one of our staff members: Rod Kreymborg, General Manager; Melanie Gibson, Marketing Manager; and Kristine Riekstins, Office Administrator; for more information.

Finally I wish to thank Alan Ralph for his dedication to the establishment and development of the College. Alan has recently decided to leave COCA and on behalf of the national COCA executive I would like to extend our gratitude and best wishes for the future. We hope your ‘financial year’ was a good one and the best of luck for the next one.

Regards,

Dr. Dale Comrie
COCA National President