ASSH 2022 Highlights, Lessons, and Favorite Moments

Season 3, Episode 40.  Chuck and Chris host a live podcast in Boston during the ASSH Annual meeting.  This is our second live podcast and, we hope, a step forward in quality and content after our inaugural effort, the London IFSSH Live Podcast.  Still some audio quality opportunities but we are making progress!

There was great audience questions and this led to good discussion on life, balance, burnout, and other topics.  We had a few audience luminaries jump right in include Jonathan Hobby and previous guest Sam Moghtaderi.  

Subscribe to our newsletter:  https://wustl.us6.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=c6fe13919f69cbe248767c4e8&id=10e0c1dd85

Please complete NEW Survey: https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=taPMTM1xbU6XS02b65bG1s4ZpoRI9wlPhXnSF2MnEXxURVRNVDNBMEVSMU1CWFpIQVA4SEtMTFcyMS4u


As always, thanks to @iampetermartin for the amazing introduction and conclusion music.
theupperhandpodcast.wustl.edu.  

Transcript

Charles Goldfarb: 0:03

Welcome to the upper hand podcast where Chuck and Chris talk Hansard.

Chris Dy: 0:07

We are two hand surgeons at Washington University in St. Louis here to talk about all things hand surgery related from technical to personal.

Charles Goldfarb: 0:15

Please subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts.

Chris Dy: 0:18

And thank you in advance for leaving a review and leaving a rating wherever you get your podcasts.

Charles Goldfarb: 0:24

Oh, hey, Chris.

Chris Dy: 0:25

Hey, Chuck, how are you?

Charles Goldfarb: 0:26

I'm good. I'm back in the basement.

Chris Dy: 0:28

This is great. We're back on our home turf. It's weird. We're not in person. And we're not traveling. And this is kind of what we usually do. Yeah,

Charles Goldfarb: 0:37

it's good to be boring. Is that fair? Good to be boring?

Chris Dy: 0:41

I guess. I mean, so how have you been? How's your week been back from the hand society?

Charles Goldfarb: 0:46

My week has been busy in a good way. cases every day busy clinics. Yeah, fantastic. What about you?

Chris Dy: 0:53

cases every day? Look at you.

Charles Goldfarb: 0:57

Well, that's except for Monday, my main my big clinic day, but but every other day. Yeah. Cases, which is, you know, keeps me honest.

Chris Dy: 1:04

It's been so good to be home. To have a normal week has been amazing. So that's been great. Getting back into rhythm of things is really good. And looking forward to being home, you know, for the next couple of months. So never, you know, back when we were all, you know, jonesing to get out and travel again, I never thought I'd say something like that. But it is really nice to be home and have the stability of the schedule. And you know, that kind of thing.

Charles Goldfarb: 1:24

For sure. And you had a crazy stretch. But I had a great hand Society meeting.

Chris Dy: 1:32

So did I have I want to hear about yours. And we we had a lot of fun, I think throughout the week, but it was it was exhausting. But it was fun.

Charles Goldfarb: 1:39

Yeah. So for me, it was I hadn't been since 2019. Obviously, no one went in 2020. 2021 Was I think partially attended, I guess I would say and I didn't feel comfortable personally going so didn't. And this meeting was in Boston for those who didn't attend. And it was fantastic. I think that I thought the content was really strong. The venue was fantastic. But it really, of course, was the people just catching up with people hadn't seen in some time. And there was all kinds of social events and educational events and just engaging. It was great. It was great. We can dive deeper. But what about your 30,000 foot view?

Chris Dy: 2:23

Same thing. I mean, it was a lot of pent up energy, which was good. I think Boston is a great venue for that meeting. I always enjoy going into Boston. I like seeing that Boston's on the schedule for a few years down the line too. I just like the vibe there. Even though I didn't really get to explore the city this time. I know that there's walkable stuff, there's great restaurants. And usually the weather's pretty darn good that time of the year. You know, I remember catching it. I think one of the years a Sox game was a Red Sox game was the international event which was super fun. So it's just a great city great venue. The conference venue itself is good. It's not crazy spread out. It was just you know, it was packed. And in a good way I think you know, so it felt really good to be there. And a lot of podcasts love. So thank you to those of you that came up and said hi to chuck into me. And it's just so interesting to have that connection in that relationship. And I've had more than a few people come up to me saying, so weird to see your face and like, talk to no like no, it's weird because all I usually hear your voice so to see you to hear your voice and and watch you present. It's just super weird. I try not to take offense to that. I knew what they were saying.

Charles Goldfarb: 3:30

Yeah, it's, um, I thought there was a little bit of a dichotomy. So you had told me there'll be some podcast love, and I'm like, okay, Chris, I'm sure maybe for you. There was some podcast love, which was great. And as I you know, thank each person who came up and said, Hello, it really is meaningful. And because the dichotomy part is some of my peers, or actually some of the even more senior members, believe it or not, there are more senior members, Chris, they would say, how do you do this? Like, how do you find the time and the energy to do this every single week? And it's the love, it's the feedback. It's the fact that you and I enjoy each other's company, but it's also the external feedback.

Chris Dy: 4:14

Right? It's a it's just loop. It's, it's, it's been very fulfilling in a lot of ways. And I think that, you know, I think there's a lot of appreciation for it. I tried to ask people what they you know, what they want to hear more of it is surgical techniques. So I think our next episode has to be about surgery itself. Yeah. Honestly, it is a super fun thing to see people. The live podcast episode was really fun. I think neither of us kind of knew what to expect there. I mean, what what would you think about that?

Charles Goldfarb: 4:45

Yeah, I think, well, it's our second live podcast and those who are listening to this episode will know that last week, we shared that through the podcast, but doing the live portion. I think we were better than we were in London. We've learned Some lessons are audio and I'm no audiophile. So I apologize for last week's audio, it's fine. It's not setting a new standard and, you know, quality, but for our simple production unit.

Chris Dy: 5:17

That's really Yeah.

Charles Goldfarb: 5:19

It was good. But I, it's hard to explain. But when you have a guy named like Jonathan Hobby, who is a real big name in British hand surgery, can I join in and share his his thoughts, and you have Sam, who is a friend of the podcast, join in and share his thoughts, and you have great content suggestions, that audience once again, it's super fun and super energizing.

Chris Dy: 5:43

It was it was just such a different, it was such a different feel. And literally anything else that I did that week, just in terms of you know, not being up behind the podium, and you know, kind of freewheeling it a bit. It was energizing. I wish more things were like that. And I think that the audience who attended appreciate it, you know, certainly there is some great energy in the room.

Charles Goldfarb: 6:07

Yeah, for sure. For sure. So, so maybe pick, I don't know, three highlights of your meeting. And, and I can do the same, we can go back and forth or something. Does that sound okay?

Chris Dy: 6:17

Yeah, that sounds great. You know, I admit that I wish I had more time to attend other sessions during this meeting, I was pretty booked in terms of, you know, speaking commitments and that kind of thing. And then there was one talk that slipped through the cracks that was supposed to be made ahead of time that didn't get made ahead of time. So there was a little study hall and the speaker ready room to to make a brand new talk. But it wasn't great. But it was more. It was time that it could have been in sessions. I mean, I thought that the theme back to basics was fantastic. You know, the symposia that I did catch were great. I always enjoy things like the founders lecture. And I loved Jeff Greenberg's presidential address, I thought the guest speaker was super interesting, you know, that he brought in, and just usually somebody from outside of hand surgery, and I thought that was really helpful to gain some perspective. You know, in terms of actual things taking home, you know, I did sit in on a lot of nerve sessions, since, you know, I was there anyway, and I'm really excited about some of the newer ways to evaluate nerve injury, I'm really gung ho on ultrasound still, and even using ultrasound in the, in the sterile field in the operating room. So you know, that, you know, my brain was turning a lot during those sessions talking about how we can bring some of that stuff back to St. Louis. So I think exploring some of the the alternative modalities, you know, really trying to get back into Mr. neurography, at our place, typically has not been used a lot just because of kind of institutional things. But I think that we're going to start to reengage on that. How about you?

Charles Goldfarb: 7:43

Cool. I think you're, and if I, if I get this if my perception is wrong, correct me. But I think your meeting was somewhat like my my meetings in years past, which is you were super busy giving a lot of talks, leading a lot of sessions, and the like, and, and I was actually believing that my meeting was gonna be pretty calm, and I would have a lot of free time. That didn't happen. I gave a handful of talks, I think five or six talks, etc, about five or six talks. But what ended up being some somewhat time consuming was meetings on for different things. And, and some of those were the highlights I'll start with, I'll start with the kind of what's it called? It's like the International Outreach committee or is the touching hands committee basically. And that's, you know, to Scott Kozin's credit, he launched this, he actually launched it in Boston, I think it was in 2014. And I haven't been involved in that with that group, despite having received some supportive funds from the touching hands project for a previous trip. And despite having been I've been involved for 20 years with a program called the world pediatric project, which I really, really like. And so I went to the meeting, and it was a kind of a roundtable meeting, there was probably 20 people in the room. And I absolutely loved the fact that there were so many really knowledgeable people who had experiences at a whole nother level compared to someone like me, despite my being in the game for a while. And really super energizing super interesting stuff, for example, and I'm going to get the details wrong. But there are, there's communication with surgeons on the ground. If the if the hands or the hand society surgeon is back home, and he or she has a relationship with a surgeon with boots on the ground. And that surgeon has questions or potentially even intra operative question of questions. They're essentially Google glasses that can be used to communicate back and forth and say, Hey, what's this? Or hey, what I'll do next. So to me that was super cool.

Chris Dy: 9:46

That is really cool. I have no idea that exists. That's awesome. is incredible

Charles Goldfarb: 9:52

and really a remarkable opportunity to make the world smaller, right. And then the second thing was interesting and and I want you to do this if you are so inclined, one of the really experienced people was talking about video. We all love video, right? Our residents live on video, right? They don't want to read, they want to watch video, all true. And this speaker was talking about how video is great. But it's the audio in the video, which makes a video really good. And so there are these cool little wireless mics that are 30 bucks, and I bought one and it's basically a pair of two. So I would wear one and whoever I'm interviewing or talking to, would wear one, and it just elevates it elevates the video. So I'm going to die. Yeah, I'm going to dive deep on that. And I'm going on a mission trip in a few weeks. And I really want to be better about capturing content both for the hands study touching hands and the world pediatric project, and just kind of sharing the experience because it's a remarkable experience.

Chris Dy: 10:55

Absolutely. I mean, I think honestly, a lot of us would benefit from having higher quality audio and video and the output are so many teachable things that you want to capture. It's just you know, for us, what holds us back, at least for me, is having the wherewithal and the resources to do it efficiently, effectively, high quality because none of us want to be working on something that isn't to the quality that we would like. So that sounds great. And then Google last thing sounds amazing. I mean, I'm always really impressed. I think hand surgeons and hand therapists do the international work at a high level in a very thoughtful way. Not only from a programmatic perspective, but particularly from you know, there's I saw some really interesting stuff coming down the pike and you know, in development from, from Lauren Shapiro and Rob, Kamal are doing some great stuff in terms of how they evaluate the work, the the footprint, the impact, you know, the connectivity with the local with the local teams. So not just going in and doing stuff and you know, leaving, but then how do we set up a program to really make it work and do it the right way? So I'm always impressed by that group. It's not something I've engaged in since medical school, but, you know, it's, it's fascinating to watch the progress.

Charles Goldfarb: 12:02

Oh, for sure. And Rob, and is doing a great job. And we are trying to figure out how we can leverage could could registry database information, and possibly use that as a mechanism because, you know, fly in fly out missions are just not not okay. And that the group I work with, does have boots on the ground, 24/7 365 days a year, but I certainly better follow up I want to know, outcomes and, you know, communicate with surgeons on the ground. So anyways, so much opportunity. So that was my, that was my first cool thing from the meeting.

Chris Dy: 12:37

One of mine was chairing co chairing the resident fellows meeting with Christina Ward from from Minneapolis, that was super fun. There was a I mean, there were almost 300 residents and fellows in the room. It was, you know, on the Wednesday of the meeting, so right before the main meeting started, people were engaged and enthusiastic, we tried to design a an agenda, that balanced, you know, the different audiences in the room, because you have, you know, some as early as medical students, but mainly residents who are interested in hand residence that are applying to Han residents that have matched and then fellows. So we ran the gamut of, you know, you know, different career and practice kind of talks, you know, how to prepare for fellowship applications, how to, you know, how to look for a job after how to make the most out of fellowship, how to look for a job, you know, negotiating all that kind of stuff. Like, I thought it was a great balance, honestly, if I do say so myself. But then the, we tried to have some panels, you know, case presentations, that kind of thing. We got some feedback that people wanted to be a little more interactive, which is interesting, because, you know, in past years, people have not wanted to be interactive. So I think maybe that's the pendulum swinging. And then we had a really fun quiz bowl. At the end of it, Christina Ward did a great job emceeing that. The lower hand team did not come through at the end, perhaps because they were poorly named Dr. grasser. They represented very well and Glenn Gaskins group from North Carolina took home via the price, but I think the quizbowl coming back was super fun. There's a lot of really, really excited people in the room. So yes, co chairing that was a highlight and there was a lot of, there's a lot of love there.

Charles Goldfarb: 14:20

I'm sure it was, it's nice that our partner glenlee was going to co chair it next year, in going to the quizbowl topic. So when we were in London, there was a lot of congenital content, a lot of congenital interested people. And so we had sort of had a quiz bowl there. And at that, I don't know that anyone knew what to expect that it ended up there were three teams like a North American team, a European team and an Asian team. And there was probably 60 People just crowded in this small room. So much like fun and energy. So we're in Minneapolis in May. We're doing the International Symposium, and definitely quizbowl is a part of it. Super fun.

Chris Dy: 14:59

Fantastic. So what was your second highlight of the meeting?

Charles Goldfarb: 15:02

Kind of sounds weird to say, but it was another committee. I mean, not not. I don't know, I think it was because again, the energy. So I have been a part of the practice committee for a long time, which some people may think sounds boring. And you know, maybe it is boring, but I think it's great. And so this meeting was about getting back to the basics, but also emphasizing the practice management of hand surgery. And so the Hand P program, which is obviously developed off the Hand E platform, so hand education platform and practice platform, as taken off, it's launched. There's great advice on there. And I just want to put a plug in, there is now a podcast, a Hand P podcast. And you and I talked to David Wei about this over time, and David had launched that, and we talked about ways

Chris Dy: 15:58

he got you got your blessing, Chuck.

Charles Goldfarb: 16:01

Yeah, I don't know if it has godfather. But I'm excited for their podcasts. And I think it can be a real nice addition to the educational space around practice management practice development.

Chris Dy: 16:14

I think that's going to be great, you know, Hand P is going to be something that many of us will go to. And it's not just for those that are in private practice. I think James Saucedo and his group have put in a lot of effort into making sure that it's broad. So I think it's an a great resource, and especially for the residents and fellows, they actually have particular tracks based on where you are in your training, whether you're in training early in practice later in practice, you know, looking at retirement, all that kind of stuff. So great content, you know, really going to be something very helpful.

Charles Goldfarb: 16:47

Yeah, perfect. All right, give me one more. And then I got one more, and then let's,

Chris Dy: 16:51

and actually, as I'm thinking of this, like, there's more and more, so maybe we'll just kind of drop some on future episodes, but I hate to be to drop a plug. But I mean, our WashU alumni reception was fantastic. It was amazing. And, you know, I'll be honest, we I want to make it about all about the fellowship, you know, but it was, it was great, you know, compared to prior years, obviously, last year was a bit of an anomaly. But you know, there were tons of people in that room, so much enthusiasm, so much pride, and it really looking at the room, it made me very proud to be an alum of the program, and now the fellowship director.

Charles Goldfarb: 17:31

So I've lived through a different era, when the cocktail hour was too long, where I would try to sneak into another one, just because there's more going on. And so to see, I don't have any people in the room 50 people, again, full of enthusiasm. And as you know, my absolute favorite thing at those events is to go around the room and catch, you know, just a brief blurb and catch people up. It was so awesome. It was fun. It was funny, good stories, and good people. It was fantastic. I'm glad you brought that up.

Chris Dy: 18:11

Yeah, I mean, you know, to look at the, the accomplishments of our alums at the meeting itself, and then over their careers. I mean, you know, there, it's, it's a special group, and I'm really happy that, you know, we were able to get together and celebrate that. And, you know, I think that that's something that as a fellowship director, I want to continue to build on what what Marty started, build on the legacy there, and then try to find ways to really connect everybody, because that's, uh, you know, that's a really great group of people accomplished, but also very thoughtful, you know, all over the country and all over the world, to be honest with you. So that was what was that was my third highlight of the meeting. And I have a few more, but I'll save mine for next time. So what was your third highlight?

Charles Goldfarb: 18:52

Yeah, my third and final, at least for this part is there was a pre course that Linley wall, chaired with Peter Waters, on pediatric and congenital hand. It was Wednesday morning, which is not an ideal time, especially for peace. It was not a huge audience. The content, and the discussion was phenomenal. Really interesting. There's some controversial topics which are brought up. All good, all really good. I will say that when when you and I know you'll appreciate this, when I watch someone like Peter Waters, who was such a great moderator, and has this God given talent of engaging those around them and asking the right question at the right time, or bringing up something provocative at the right time. It's awesome. I mean, it's just like watching I don't know what the analogy is, but it's just so cool to see someone do that. Do it at a high level. So I love the whole morning and literally did a great job and obviously Peter waters did a great job.

Chris Dy: 19:58

You know, I've had I haven't been fortunate enough to have a lot of interaction with Peter until this meeting. And I, he gave the Richard Smith lecture at the resident fellows day. And it was one of the best talks I have ever seen. It was amazing. I actually bought two books, because of his dog that I have to read now. But it was incredible. So I can see his gift, as a speaker, incredibly engaging, and I can only imagine how good he is as a moderator. So that's a skill and you know, some people have it, and then you develop it over time. But it's impressive when when you see it, so I can obviously see how that's a highlight for you.

Charles Goldfarb: 20:33

Yeah, yeah. So two things, Chris, before of course, of course, wine, you gotta share the books, either we can put them in the show notes. Or if you if you remember the titles off your head, share them, and to our podcast that dropped last week. Now, two weeks ago, by the time this airs, it was also related to the Smith lecture from the residents and fellows conference. They right, it was Peter Carter's 20 year ago lecture about the family and society. So if you haven't caught that, listen to it if you want, but watch it on YouTube. It's fantastic. And that that that opportunity to speak at that conference is something.

Chris Dy: 21:13

Absolutely. So yeah, check that out. I will put the books in the show notes. I don't want to mess up one of the titles. One of them is about the hand. The other one is more of a recent leadership book. So we'll put those in the show notes. I'll email that to you. And you know, maybe we should have Peter on the top of it to, you know, give something along the lines of his talk, because it was fantastic. So teasers for next time. Look forward to seeing you guys are listening or you guys listening to us and connecting with you guys. That's next week.

Charles Goldfarb: 21:38

Awesome. Thanks. Have a good day. You too. Hey, Chris. That was fun. Let's do it again real soon.

Chris Dy: 21:44

Sounds good. Well, be sure to check us out on Twitter at Han podcast. Hey, Chuck, what's your Twitter handle?

Charles Goldfarb: 21:49

Mine is@congenitalhand. What about you?

Chris Dy: 21:52

Mine is @ChrisDy MD spelled d-y. And if you'd like to email us, you can reach us at handpodcast@gmail.com.

Charles Goldfarb: 22:00

And remember, please subscribe wherever you get your podcast

Chris Dy: 22:03

and be sure to leave a review that helps us get the word out.

Charles Goldfarb: 22:06

Special thanks to Peter Martin for the amazing music. And remember, keep the upper hand come back next