AAGL Announcement: Dr. Charles Koh as Honorary Chair of the AAGL 55th Annual Congress

The AAGL 55th Annual Congress in Boston will be an inflection point for our field. 

As we shape a program centered on Empowering Women’s Voices: Surgical Excellence, Digital Transformation & Outcomes-Driven Care, we must also be intentional about the standards we uphold, the pioneers we honor, and the future we choose to build. It is therefore my privilege to announce Dr. Charles Koh as the Honorary Chair of the 2026 Congress. 

Few surgeons have shaped modern MIGS as profoundly as Dr. Koh. His career represents the rare convergence of technical mastery, relentless innovation, and an uncompromising commitment to surgical excellence. Long before minimally invasive gynecologic surgery became mainstream, Dr. Koh was already redefining what was thought possible. 

Born in Singapore, Dr. Koh’s story is itself extraordinary. A President’s Scholar with no family background in medicine, he simultaneously pursued medicine and music — teaching himself guitar and vibraphone, performing professionally in renowned Singapore nightclubs while attending medical school. Colleagues described him as a brilliant student who could perform live music into the evening and still excel academically at the highest level. That uncommon combination of artistry and discipline would later find its fullest expression in the operating room — in the precision of his tissue handling, the elegance of his reconstructive technique, and a surgical philosophy grounded in the belief that true mastery is as much craft as it is science. 

Professionally, Dr. Koh transformed the field. Inspired by the pioneering microsurgical work of Robert Winston in London, he became determined to achieve what many considered impossible: true laparoscopic microsurgery using 8-0 suture. Through years of experimentation and refinement, he ultimately performed and presented the world’s first laparoscopic microsurgical tubal reanastomosis in 1992, achieving pregnancy rates of 81% — superior to the traditional open microsurgery pioneered by his own mentor. 

What followed was equally transformative. Dr. Koh pioneered “suturing in the Vertical Zone,” fundamentally changing laparoscopic suturing ergonomics and enabling advanced reconstructive procedures. The Koh needle holder became one of the most widely utilized and replicated laparoscopic instruments in the world. He later introduced the KOH Cup and pneumo-occluder system, innovations that helped simplify and standardize total laparoscopic hysterectomy. His work in radical excision of endometriosis, fertility-preserving surgery, bowel resection, and multidisciplinary pelvic surgery helped define the modern era of complex MIGS as we practice it today. 

Personally, Dr. Koh’s influence on my own surgical development has been profound. One year after winning the Suturing Olympics Award at the Fellows Bootcamp hosted by Dr. Koh at his home institution in Wisconsin, I received a one-line email from him inviting me to teach at his renowned laparoscopic suturing course — an educational experience that has shaped generations of MIGS surgeons around the world. I went on to teach numerous courses with him throughout the US and abroad, and I learned from Dr. Koh not only through direct mentorship, but through countless hours studying his videos, techniques, and philosophy of laparoscopic microsurgery and tubal reanastomosis. His approach fundamentally changed how I think about precision, reconstruction, tissue handling, and the artistry of surgery itself. 

As we define the next era of surgical innovation and outcomes-driven care, Dr. Koh’s lifetime of work provides more than inspiration — it provides the foundation upon which modern MIGS was built, and the benchmark our future innovations must strive to exceed. 

This appointment is not ceremonial. It is intentional. 

As we rapidly embrace artificial intelligence, digital transformation, robotics, and data-driven surgery, we must remain grounded in the principles that define true excellence: judgment, discipline, technical mastery, and an unwavering commitment to improving outcomes for women. 

We are gathering to shape the future of MIGS — and Boston, a city whose very identity was forged by revolution, intellectual courage, and the refusal to accept the limits of the possible, is exactly the right place to do it. 

There are few individuals more deserving to help anchor that vision than Dr. Charles Koh.