International pearls My experience educating and learning in Kuwait By Jon C. Davidson, MD, FSIR I
n early February, just weeks before COVID-19 began prompting international travel restrictions, I was given the opportunity to speak and educate overseas in Kuwait. I was one of several radiologists invited to present at Pearls in Emergency Radiology, a CME-credited conference put on by the Kuwait Radiology Society to further educate on the field of emergency imaging.
I learned about the opportunity through SIR International Division Councilor Brian F. Stainken, MD, FSIR. I had never been to the Middle East and did not know very much about the local customs before participating. Kuwait has a strong regional interventional radiology presence, but many IRs were more familiar with
Much of the value in traveling overseas is not just in educating, but in building relationships.
larger conferences like PAIRS in Dubai. However, smaller societies like the one in Kuwait are also doing interesting and crucial work in their communities.
Though the conference was not focused solely on interventional radiology, the organizers wanted an IR involved to present on interventional procedures and showcase how IR can play a role in emergency radiology. Over 4 days I worked with local
physicians and four other American academic diagnostic radiologists to provide much of the meeting’s presentation content.
My sessions offered an overview of the techniques and procedures that make IR so valuable to emergency care. My presentations focused on trauma care in the United States and treating solid organ trauma and penetrating trauma. I provided a technical primer on placing nephrostomy tubes and delivered lectures on portal hypertension and IVC filters and retrievals. In each of these sessions, particularly the discussions regarding IVC filters, I received detailed, insightful questions and had engaging, intellectually stimulating conversations.
Much of the value in traveling overseas is not just in educating, but in building relationships. I became close with my fellow American presenters, whom I did not know previously: Avneesh Chhabra, MD, section chief of MSK Imaging at UT Southwestern, Bharti Khurana, MD, director of Emergency MSK Radiology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Ajay Singh, MD, associate director of Emergency Radiology at Massachusetts General Hospital. During the presentations, I was also able to meet IRs from Egypt, Oman, Bahrain, Jordan and even Serbia, as well as local Kuwaiti IRs.
One of my favorite memories of this conference was just after I had given a lecture discussing a case of embolizing a typical inferior epigastric artery that had presented with a rectus sheath hematome. The local IR who was moderating was also on call during the
32 IRQ | SUMMER 2020
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