The Countdown Has Begun: The American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress 2014 and Obesity Week 2014
Dear friends and colleagues,
In this issue of Bariatric Times, we present our 25th installment of “Checklists in Bariatric Surgery.” This checklist is for strictures after laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG). At my center, we have a 0.6-percent incidence of strictures after LSG, so we find this to be a rare complication. However, we believe it to be the most frequent among all complications after LSG. Diagnosis and management should be integrated into a care path as shown in this checklist. We hope you clip and save this convenient checklist and find it useful as a reference tool in your everyday practice.
In “The Medical Student Notebook,” edited by Dan Jones, MD, Kyle Chechi, MS, discusses the physiology of insulin and diabetes in bariatric surgery. I just reviewed a very interesting manuscript with Walter Pories, MD, as senior author that identified and questioned the high levels of insulin in diabetic patients. Should we be giving insulin to these patients if insulin appears to be the common denominator that might correlate with comorbidities?
Silvia Leite Faria, MSc, RD; Orlando Pereira Faria, MD; Mariane de Almeida Cardeal; and Caroline Soares Menezes review the current literature on treating of the post-surgery influence of physical activity and, based on the findings, propose recommendations directly related to the needs of the physically active bariatric patient.
Don’t miss “Taking Bariatric Safety to the Next Level,” by Philip R. Schauer, MD; James W. Saxton, Esq; and Amanda R. Budak, RN, CBN, PhD. The authors discuss improving patient safety while decreasing liability exposure. As mentioned by the authors, “We can only improve if we measure what we do.” With the new healthcare system “value is more important than volume” and “Value-Based Care” will replace “Fee for Service.” With that said, we will have to adjust our measurements. Now, surgeons will need to talk to their patients’ referring doctors and spend time in after-care surgery. Integrated healthcare systems looking at patients as a whole from before, during, and after surgeries will become routine. The three above mentioned stages of care will be bundled in payments, and we will have to make sure that our patients do not show up in other emergency rooms or get admitted unnecessarily.
Also in this issue, we are pleased to present the first installment of our new column “Spotlight on Surgical Fellowships.” With the vision of Bruce Schirmer, MD, and Lee Swanstrom, MD, the Foundation for Surgical Fellowships (FSF) was created to salvage postgraduate non-ACGME surgical education. Each year, 70 to 80 percent of graduating residents apply for fellowship training. In conjunction with the FSF, the fellowship council offers these unique training opportunities for young surgeons. We hope you enjoy this new feature, especially readers that are involved in educating general surgery residents and fellows.
This month, Drs. Pascal Fuchshuber, Amin Madani, Daniel B. Jones, and Steven Schwaitzberg, discuss the Fundamental Use of Surgical Energy (FUSE) Program, the third Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons (SAGES) Fundamentals Program. FUSE is a comprehensive, multidisciplinary, educational program that teaches the appropriate and safe use of all energy devices in surgery and endoscopy. Learn more during the American College of Surgeons (ACS) Clinical Congress 2014 at the SAGES booth.
The countdown has started for ACS Clinical Congress 2014 in San Francisco, California, and Obesity Week 2014 in Boston, Massachusetts. I am very much looking forward to meeting you at either of those conferences. I invite you to stop by the Bariatric Times booth at both meetings, pick up a journal, check out our text books and new offerings, and share your ideas. I also invite you to participate in the ASMBS Foundation’s Exhibit Expedition, a new kind of “indoor walk” around the industrial exhibits that will allow us to raise funds to support research, education, advocacy, and peer recognition. More importantly, you can win great prizes like ASMBS logo items, and the grand prize, a four-night stay in Kona, Hawaii with $500 toward airfare. During this year’s ASMBS Foundation L.E.A.D. Awards luncheon, which will be held Monday, November 3, 2014, we will present new awards for safety and nutrition. Don’t miss the opportunity to get up on your chairs to applaud and congratulate Robert Brolin, MD, our Outstanding Achievement Award winner. I look forward to seeing you there!
Sincerely,
Raul J. Rosenthal, MD, FACS, Clinical Editor, Bariatric Times; Interim Chief of Staff, Professor of Surgery and Chairman, Department of General Surgery; Director of Minimally Invasive Surgery and The Bariatric and Metabolic Institute; General Surgery Residency Program Director; and Director, Fellowship in MIS and Bariatric Surgery, Cleveland Clinic Florida, Weston, Florida
Category: Editorial Message, Past Articles
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