2018 SCCACS Newsletter

Southern California Chapter
American College of Surgeons
SCCACS Summer Newsletter 2018 — Vol. 23

President’s Message
Chapter Information
Young Surgeon Representatives’ Report
Commission on Cancer Liaison Report
Women in Surgery Report
Committee on Trauma
Report from the Recorder
2019 Annual Scientific Meeting

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

By Ninh Nguyen, MD, FACS
President, Southern California Chapter, American College of Surgeons

On behalf of the Board of the Southern California Chapter of the American College of Surgeons, we send you our warmest regards, and hope that you have had an enjoyable summer. Our annual meeting this past May was successful thanks to the superb leadership of President Vincent Rowe, MD, FACS, and our Program Chair Kevork Kazanjian, MD, FACS. We thank them for their diligent work and planning.

Over the past months, we have been preparing for our next annual meeting. Planning is almost complete so as to assure yet another fabulous event in Santa Barbara for this coming January. Here is a preview of what we have planned so far for our upcoming meeting:

The SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting will be held at the Four Seasons Resort Biltmore Santa Barbara from January 25-27, 2019. We have arranged for a limited block of rooms at a deeply discounted rate of $380/night. Rooms at this rate are available until the block is sold out (until December 14, 2018). Please be sure to review the deposit and cancellation rules for reservations. You can find details on the Chapter website. Please make reservations directly with the hotel at (805) 969-2261 and mention the Southern California Chapter of the American College of Surgeons to take advantage of the discounted rate.

I am pleased to announce that one of our invited speaker will be James D. Luketich, MD, FACS. Dr. Luketich is the Henry T. Bahnson Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery , Chairman, Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Chief, Division of Thoracic and Foregut Surgery, Director, Thoracic Surgical Oncology, Co-Director, Lung Cancer Center and the Associate Director of Surgical Affairs, University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute. Dr. Luketich is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, and is a member of many prestigious surgical societies including the American Surgical Association, the American Association for Thoracic Surgery, and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, among many others. He will provide an inspiring Presidential Keynote Lecture.

We are very pleased that David Hoyt, MD, FACS, Executive Director of the American College of Surgeons, will once again be joining us. He will be giving us updates on the national issues facing surgeons and activities of the College.

The Women in Surgery Luncheon will feature Barbara L. Bass, MD. Dr. Bass is the Professor of Surgery, Institute for Academic Medicine, Executive Director, Houston Methodist Institute for Technology, Innovation & Education. She is a John F., Jr. and Carolyn Bookout Presidential Distinguished Chair, Department of Surgery, and Professor of Surgery, Institute for Academic Medicine. Dr. Bass is the current President of the American College of Surgeons.

The Women in Surgery Luncheon will feature Jo Carol Hiatt, MD, MBA, FACS. Dr. Hiatt is Chair of the National Product Council for Kaiser Permanente (KP) and also chairs KP’s Inter-Regional New Technologies Committee. She is a partner in Southern California Permanente Medical Group (SCPMG) and is currently Assistant Medical Director, SCPMG Business Management. Dr. Hiatt chairs Southern California’s Medical Technology Deployment Strategy Team as well as the Oversight Committee for Integrated Medical Imaging.

Program Highlights
Program Chair Lydia Lam, MD, FACS, Associate Program Chair Angela Neville, MD, FACS, and Assistant Program Chair Maheswari Senthil, MD, FACS are actively developing the program for the annual meeting. We are confident that through their efforts, the meeting will attain the same level of excellence as all of our prior meetings. We will have a combination of high quality scientific papers and invited guest lecturers. We anticipate the topics will once again address the needs of surgeons in practice in general surgery and surgical sub-specialties, as well as those of surgeons-in-training. We will have specialty section sessions in Pediatric Surgery, General Surgery, Surgical Oncology, Cardiothoracic, Vascular, Plastic/Head & Neck, Colorectal and Bariatric surgery. Back by popular demand, a “Battle of the Blades” debate session in minimally invasive surgery will be included.

The ever-popular “What’s New?” sessions will be on Friday. Topics include what’s new in Colorectal, Hernia, Critical Care, Palliative Care, Oncology, and Acute Care Surgery.

We encourage you to bring your family and join us for the Friday evening cocktail reception. You can enjoy an abundance of food, drink and music. This is a time to relax and mingle among friends and colleagues, and it’s one of my favorite events. The awards for best scientific paper will be announced then. Plus, we have an excellent band of fellow surgeons who will rock the night away with us.

It can’t be a Saturday without Surgical Jeopardy. For the 11th year, the SoCal residency programs will fight against each other for the Annual Dowden Cup. It’s standing room only, so show up early to cheer for your favorite team! Last year’s competition was extremely close with the team from Loma Linda prevailing to take the Cup – who will triumph this year?The Southern California Region ACS Committee on Trauma will be hosting a Trauma Medical Director’s breakfast on Sunday, preceding the Trauma Surgery specialty session. All trauma papers submitted to the meeting will have the option of being reviewed for inclusion in the ACS-COT resident research competition, as well. The top clinical and basic sciences papers will get all-expenses paid trips to the regional competition in December 2018.

The California Chapter of the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery will be having a business meeting during the SCCACS meeting weekend. We have had a successful alliance for the past couple of years. We welcome the ASMBS Chapter members from across our beautiful state to participate in the meeting.

Call for Abstracts
Abstracts for the Annual Scientific Meeting program participation are being accepted through Friday, September 14th. Details for abstract submission are posted here. If successfully selected for plenary session oral presentation, most papers will be published in a special issue of The American Surgeon. This is a great opportunity, especially for young surgeons-to-be and surgeons-in-training, to gain experience in presenting at a major conference and in publishing in a peer-reviewed journal.

This year the ACS Commission on Cancer will be conducting a Resident Research Paper Competition with a cash prize for the winner and a chance to continue toward a national competition. Similarly, the ACS Committee on Trauma will have its annual Resident Research contest.

Please Help Recruit Vendors
I am asking for your individual help to boost fundraising and industry participation for the meeting. Such support allows us to keep membership dues and registration fees at a more modest level. This is especially important in the era of regulatory statutes limiting and restraining support from individual industry partners.

If you have any special relationship with industry representatives who have supported us in the past, or whom you feel will have an interest in doing so now, please forward their contact information directly to Jim Dowden, SCCACS Executive Director, at admin@socalsurgeons.org. He will take over from there and provide prospects with the necessary follow-up, coordinate with our sponsor committee, and offer the vendors a selection of opportunities for participation in the meeting.

Don’t forget to register early and reserve your hotel rooms! We hope that you and your family will join us in Santa Barbara, January 25-27, 2019. You are an integral part of our SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting, and I encourage you to take advantage of our high level program, participate in the many opportunities for education and recreation, and take some time for relaxation.

CHAPTER INFORMATION

SCCACS is your organization. Below are some reminders about Chapter activities, as well as contact information for Chapter leaders. The leaders want to hear from you with any comments and suggestions:

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS

Abstracts for the 2019 Annual Scientific Meeting program participation are being accepted through close of business on Friday, September 14th. You are invited to submit an abstract on the clinical or laboratory research project of your choice. Abstracts are only accepted through this online submission form. Abstracts must conform to the Instructions for Preparation of Abstract, and they may not have been submitted to a journal for publication, published previously or presented at a national or regional meeting prior to the 2018 Chapter meeting. Be sure to read through this newsletter for opportunities for Resident Research competitions from both the Commission on Cancer and the Committee on Trauma.

THE AMERICAN SURGEON ONLINE ACCESS
Chapter members are provided free online access to the American Surgeon Journal published by the Southeastern Surgical Congress. This service is provided as part of your annual membership dues. In order to access the Journal online, you must set up an account for those purposes with the Journal publisher. You will need to provide your 5-digit Chapter membership ID to complete the process. Follow the instructions posted here to gain online access. Contact Chapter offices if you have any questions or trouble gaining access.

OFFICERSPresident Ninh Nguyen, MD, FACS, ninhn@uci.edu
President-Elect J. Craig Collins, MD, FACS, j.craig.collins@kp.org
Vice-President Kenji Inaba, MD, FACS, kinaba@surgery.usc.edu
Secretary-Treasurer Farin Amersi, MD, FACS,
Recorder Sharon Lum, MD FACS, slum@llu.edu

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Gabriel Akopian, MD, FACS, akopianmd@gmail.com
Peyman Benharash, MD, FACS, pbenharash@mednet.ucla.edu
L. Andrew DiFronzo, MD, FACS, andrew.l.difronzo@kp.org
Melinda Maggard Gibbons, MD, FACS, mmaggard@mednet.ucla.edu
Namir Katkhouda, MD, FACS
Dennis Y. Kim, MD FACS, dennisyongkim@gmail.com
Brian Smith, MD, FACS, briansmith11@va.gov
Areti Tillou, MD, FACS, atillou@mednet.ucla.edu
Karen Woo, MD, FACS, kwoo@mednet.ucla.edu

PAST PRESIDENTS
Vincent Rowe, MD, FACS, vincent.rowe@surgery.usc.edu
Christian de Virgilio, MD, FACS, cdevirgilio@labiomed.org
O. Joe Hines, MD, FACS, joehines@mednet.ucla.edu
Shirin Towfigh, MD, FACS, shirintowfigh@gmail.com

PROGRAM COMMITTEE

Program Chair Lydia Lam, MD, FACS, lydialam2@gmail.com
Associate Chair Angela Neville, MD, FACS angelane13@gmail.com
Assistant Chair Maheswari Senthil, MD, FACS msenthil@llu.edu

Commission on Cancer State Chair
Sharon Lum, MD, FACS, slum@llu.edu

Committee on Trauma
Kenji Inaba, MD, FACS, kinaba@surgery.usc.edu

Representative, Association of Women Surgeons
Talar Tejirian, MD, FACS, talar.x.tejirian@kp.org

Young Surgeon Representatives

Joseph C. Carmichael, MD, FACS
Maheswari Senthil, MD, FACS, msenthil@llu.edu

Executive Director
C. James Dowden, administrator@socalsurgeons.org

YOUNG SURGEONS REPRESENTATIVES’ REPORT

By Joseph C. Carmichael, MD, FACS and Maheswari Senthil, MD, FACS
SCCACS 2018 Young Surgeons Representatives

Introduction and Young Surgeons’ Breakfast

Southern California Chapter ACS strongly supports young surgeon’s career development through various activities throughout the year and during the annual meeting. The Young Surgeons’ Breakfast is one of such activity and is a key highlight of the SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting in Santa Barbara.

This year’s event promises to be just as exciting with a planned breakfast session on Saturday morning, January 26th, for surgeons under the age of 45. At the breakfast, attendees will have the opportunity to discuss health care policies, career planning and work/life balance with the distinguished surgeons. Please make plans to join us for this highly rated annual event.

Surgical Jeopardy

The Surgical Jeopardy competition will take place on Saturday afternoon at the Annual Scientific Meeting in 2019. Residents from Southern California residency programs will compete for the coveted Dowden Trophy, as well as bragging rights in what should be an educational and highly entertaining event. Preliminary rounds will pit residency programs against one another, with the winner of each round advancing to final jeopardy for the tournament of champions.

Last year’s competition was exciting with the team from Loma Linda taking the trophy in the Final Jeopardy round. We will be contacting Southern California residency program directors and residents to encourage them to attend the meeting and represent their program in this exciting competition.

Young Surgeons’ Travel Stipend
The SCCACS is again offering the Young Surgeons’ Travel Stipend, which will be awarded on a competitive basis. The recipients of the 2018 Young Surgeon Travel Stipends were Mehraneh (Doran) Jafari, MD Irvine and Kaushik Mukherjee, MD, FACS Loma Linda. The purpose of the award is to encourage young practicing surgeons to participate in our local Chapter and/or national American College of Surgeons meetings by providing a stipend of $1,000 each to cover meeting attendance expenses. The winners will be announced at the Young Surgeons’ Breakfast on Saturday and must be present to receive the award.

More details and travel stipend applications are posted on the chapter’s website. The deadline for submission is 5:00 pm PST Monday, January 9, 2019. We look forward to seeing you all in Santa Barbara this January!

COMMISSION ON CANCER LIAISON REPORT

By Sharon S. Lum, MD, FACS
State Chair, Southern California Chapter ACS
Commission on Cancer, California Zone S

The mission of the Commission on Cancer (CoC), a program of the American College of Surgeons, is to improve survival and quality of life for cancer patients by recognizing cancer programs for their commitment to providing comprehensive, high-quality, and multidisciplinary patient-centered care. CoC accredited cancer programs must fulfill a rigorous set of standards on a three-year cycle. At the recent spring CoC meeting in Chicago, work has been initiated on a revised standards manual that aims to incorporate standards focused on improving patient care and eliminating redundancy.

At the 2019 SoCal ACS Chapter Annual Scientific Meeting, we will again be hosting the annual Physician-In-Training Cancer Research Paper Competition. The 2018 winner was Dr. Blake Babcock of Loma Linda. His paper was entitled, “Factors Predictive of Outcomes after Cytoreductive Surgery and Heated Intraperitoneal Chemotherapy for Colon and Appendiceal Carcinomatosis.” Selections from the SoCal meeting in January 2019 will be advanced to the national competition for a chance to win a $1,000 prize plus travel to present their research at the annual CoC meeting during the college meeting in October 2019. Please inspire all trainees to submit their work by the abstract deadline in September for this prestigious award.

Our Cancer Liaison Physicians Meeting will be held in Santa Barbara on Sunday, January 27, 2019 in conjunction with the Annual Scientific Meeting. Please join us if you would like to learn more about the Commission on Cancer.

WOMEN IN SURGERY REPORT

By Talar Tejirian, MD, FACS
Representative, Association of Women Surgeons

One of the most anticipated events of the annual SCCACS meeting every year is the Annual Women in Surgery Luncheon. This year we had the pleasure of having a distinguished guest speaker, Julie Ann Sosa, MD, MA, FACS. Her talk on was an informative and engaging talk. We were delighted to have the attendance of so many students, residents, fellows and attending surgeons who, not only learned a great deal but also had the opportunity to meet and network with other female surgeons from a variety of specialties.

Next year will be the 11th Annual Women in Surgery Luncheon. It will take place on Saturday, January 26, 2019, during the Annual SCCACS meeting at the Four Seasons Biltmore in Santa Barbara. We are very excited to have two amazing and exciting speakers! Jo Carol Hiatt, MD, MBA, FACS is Chair of the National Product Council for Kaiser Permanente (KP) and also chairs KP’s Inter-Regional New Technologies Committee. She is a partner in Southern California Permanente Medical Group (SCPMG) and is currently Assistant Medical Director, SCPMG Business Management. Dr. Hiatt chairs Southern California’s Medical Technology Deployment Strategy Team as well as the Oversight Committee for Integrated Medical Imaging. Barbara L. Bass, MD, Professor of Surgery, Institute for Academic Medicine, Executive Director, Houston Methodist Institute for Technology, Innovation & Education. She is a John F., Jr. and Carolyn Bookout Presidential Distinguished Chair, Department of Surgery, and Professor of Surgery, Institute for Academic Medicine. Dr. Bass is the current President of the American College of Surgeons.

You won’t want to miss this amazing event! Please make plans now to attend the 11th Annual Women in Surgery Luncheon. Mark your calendars and make sure you RSVP for this event.

Don’t forget to join the Southern California ACS Women in Surgery Facebook group. This is a closed group whose purpose is to facilitate communication and information among female surgeons in Southern California. It is also a forum where we can all communicate with one another in an informal fashion. We encourage everyone to join! Please send me a message via email or Facebook with any questions.

ACS COMMITTEE ON TRAUMA

By Kenji Inaba, MD, FACS, FRCSC Chair,
Areti Tillou, MD, FACS, Vice-Chair, SCCACS Committee on Trauma,
Elizabeth Benjamin, MD, FACS Vice-Chair, SCCACS Committee on Trauma,
Eric Ley, MD FACS Vice-Chair, SCCACS Committee on Trauma

The Southern California Chapter of ACS Committee on Trauma remains committed to improving the care of injured patients in this region and to providing education to surgeons caring for these patients. It sponsors ATLS, ASSET, DMEP, and TOPIC courses, as well as the local Resident Trauma Paper Competition.

For 2018, we will continue to link submissions for the ACS-COT Resident Research Paper Competition with abstract submissions for the SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting. Last year, more than 20 outstanding abstracts were submitted, representing all of the Surgery training programs in our region.

2018 Region IX Resident Research Competition
This year, USC will be hosting a one-day research competition for all Southern California papers. This is scheduled for October 5th. The winning papers will then go onto the Region IX competition which will be at Stanford, tentatively scheduled for December 1, 2018. The competition will host the top clinical and basic science papers from CA, NV, AZ, and HI at a one-day symposium. Specific details and dates will be announced closer to the event, once the final plans are set. We will be accepting submissions for the resident competition at the same time as the SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting. If you would like an abstract considered that will not be submitted to the SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting, please send it directly to my office – contact Jackie Stout for submission details (323-409-8597). We are looking forward to having another year where our outstanding Southern California Residents present their state-of-the-art research.

Finally, our local trauma directors will meet to discuss issues relevant to our region during the Annual Scientific Meeting in Santa Barbara. More details regarding the location and time will be sent along this fall.

REPORT FROM THE RECORDER

By Sharon Lum, MD, FACS
Chapter Recorder

For the 2018 meeting, we received over 150 abstract submissions. New this year, the Program Committee had an opportunity to select top abstracts for potential publication in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons (JACS). We are pleased that in our inaugural year, a manuscript was accepted and published by JACS –
“One-Year Mortality after Contemporary Laparoscopic Bariatric Surgery: An Analysis of the Bariatric Outcomes Longitudinal Database”
Colette S. Inaba, Christina Y. Koh, Sarath Sujatha-Bhaskar, Jack P. Silva, Yanjun Chen, Danh V. Nguyen, Ninh T. Nguyen
Journal of the American College of Surgeons, Vol. 226, Issue 6, p1166–1174

In addition, 36 manuscripts approved by SCCACS member peer reviewers will be published in the October 2018 edition of The American Surgeon.

For the 2019 meeting, the top abstracts will again be selected for a potential publication opportunity in JACS. I encourage you to consider submitting your best work for this high impact journal. Please remember that the duty and privilege of SCCACS membership is peer review. Contact me at slum@llu.edu if you would like to become more involved in the review process.

2018 SURGERY ACADEMIC ORAL EXAMINATION COURSE OFFERINGS

The Certifying Examination (CE) Review Course will be offered January 11-15, 2018 in Santa Barbara at the Montecito Inn, prior to the ACS Southern California Chapter meeting. Courses are limited to 16 participants each and generally fill-up quickly. Surgeons who have not passed the certifying examination (CE) or senior residents or fellows who anticipate difficulty with the certifying examination will receive individual feedback from national faculty on their oral skills and knowledge base.

The full description and registration information are available online. For more information, contact Dr. Pamela Rowland at nesurgery@gmail.com.

2019 ANNUAL SCIENTIFIC MEETING

By Lydia Lam, MD, FACS
SCCACS, Program Chair

On behalf of the Southern California Chapter of the American College of Surgeons and President Ninh Nguyen, MD, FACS, I would like to invite you to attend the 2019 Annual Scientific Meeting January 25-27 at the idyllic Four Seasons Biltmore in Santa Barbara. Associate Program Chair Angela Neville, MD, FACS, Assistant Program Chair Maheswari Senthil, MD, FACS, and I are honored to organize the largest chapter meeting in the country and have been working hard to keep the meeting both educational and entertaining. Cutting edge research will be presented in oral and poster formats alongside high-yield sessions to review What’s New in Colorectal, Hernia, Critical Care, Palliative Care, Oncology and Acute Care Surgery. Specialty Sessions will provide in depth knowledge for surgeons of all disciplines. CME with Self-Assessment credit will be available for general and specialty sessions to fulfill Maintenance of Certification requirements. And the always popular Surgical Jeopardy Competition will crown the top surgical residency program in Southern California—so come and root for your trainees!

Highlights of the upcoming 2019 Meeting:

Special guest David Hoyt, MD, FACS, Executive Director of the American College of Surgeons, will update the Chapter on the activities of the ACS
Special guest James D. Luketich, MD, FACS, Associate Director of Surgical Affairs, University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, will deliver the Presidential Keynote Lecture
Special guest Barbara L. Bass, MD, Professor of Surgery, Institute for Academic Medicine, Executive Director, Houston Methodist Institute for Technology, Innovation & Education, will be a featured speaker at the Women in Surgery Luncheon
Invited faculty Jo Carol Hiatt, MD, MBA, FACS, Chair of the National Product Council for Kaiser Permanente (KP) and chair of the KP’s Inter-Regional New Technologies Committee, will be a featured speaker at the Women in Surgery Luncheon
Standing room only session, the 11th Annual Resident Surgical Jeopardy Competition, will showcase all southern California residencies competing for the Dowden Cup
Learn and laugh at the Battle of the Blades, an animated debate on general surgery topics
More than 80 new research presentations, including a wine and cheese poster session
Rapid review What’s New in Surgery series
Young Surgeons’ Breakfast with mentorship from invited faculty
Women in Surgery Luncheon
Welcome Cocktail Reception for members and family
Breakout meetings from the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma and Commission on Cancer and the California Chapter of the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery
Self-assessment CME for Maintenance of Certification available for the general, poster, and specialty sessions

Specialty Sessions include:

Colon & Rectal Surgery
Cardiothoracic &Vascular Surgery
Surgical Oncology & Breast Surgery
Plastic / Head & Neck Surgery
Pediatric Surgery
Trauma Surgery
Minimally Invasive & General Surgery
Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery

Save the dates Friday, January 25 through Sunday, January 27, 2019. Click here for online meeting registration and hotel information. The early bird discounted conference registration and room rate deadline is December 14th. However, the Four Seasons room block always sells out, so we strongly encourage you to make your reservations early.

We hope you will join us at the 2019 SCCACS Annual Scientific Meeting to learn, network, and relax in a stunning resort among colleagues and friends.

We look forward to seeing you in Santa Barbara January 25-27, 2019.

Introduction