The Salzburg Weill Cornell Seminar in General Surgery took place for the sixth time from May 8 to 14, 2022, at Schloss Arenberg. The OMI, in collaboration with Weill Cornell Medicine and the Medical University of Vienna, runs both a seminar on Trauma and Emergency Surgery and a seminar on General Surgery. There two courses alternate each year, and this week’s General Surgery course hosted 32 fellows from 24 different countries, including doctors from Albania, Estonia, Lithuania, Moldova, Nigeria, Qatar, and more.
Dr. Michael D. Lieberman, Director of Surgery at The Jay Monahan Center for Gastrointestinal Health, Director of Surgical Oncology at the NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, and Associate Professor of Clinical Surgery at Weill Medical College of Cornell University, participated for the eight time and served as the course director. The faculty was completed by Dr. Thomas Bachleitner-Hofmann, Dr. Michael Bergmann, Dr. Klaus Kaczirek, Dr. Anton G. Kelly, Dr. Matthias Paireder, Dr. Alessio Pigazzi, Dr. Seth Plancher, Dr. Christian Scheuba, Dr. Gerd Silberhumer, and Dr. Mia Talmor.
The faculty members created an excellent schedule for the week, which comprised of 19 didactic lectures that covered a range of topics such as Emergent Hernia Surgery, Robotic Colorectal Surgery, GYN Surgery for the General Surgeon, Pancreatic Cancer Surgery, Breast Reconstruction, and more. Faculty members presented case presentations to the fellows on Monday afternoon, focusing on best practices for how to present a case. Tuesday and Thursday afternoon were reserved for fellows’ own case presentations which come from their personal work experiences. These presentations are often a highlight for all fellows, as they can learn about cases, diseases, and rare conditions that might be specific to certain parts of the world. Six cases were selected by the faculty as excellent case presentations, which will be featured on the OMI Online Case Library. Dr. Arvit Llazani from Albania held is presentation about Synchronous Colorectal Cancer Treated in Two Stages, Dr. Nikolay Valchev from Bulgaria talked about A Small Bowel Obstruction in a Teenager, Dr. Boris Bevanda from Croatia informed his colleagues about Diaphragmatic Hernia Surgery, and Dr. Peter Kolozsi from Hungary held a presentation on Laparoscopic Transgastric Resection of Subepithelial Gastric Tumor. Dr. Jānis Rudzītis’ presentation is called Fulminant Ischemic Pancolitis while Dr. Ali Toffaha from Qatar talked about Aortoenteric Fistula.
Wednesday brought one of the first warm, sunny, spring days of the year, providing faculty and fellows the perfect opportunity to truly soak up Salzburg’s beauty and culture during their free afternoon. Thursday evening offered an exclusive chamber music concert for faculty and fellows here at Schloss Arenberg, an event that is always appreciated in the city of Mozart. Last but not least, Friday evening concluded the course with a formal dinner and graduation ceremony.
