By Tara Hulen
UAB’s Surgical Webcasts Seen Around the World
People from around the world watched innovative surgeries take place live in University Hospital’s new state-of-the-art operating rooms in a series of Internet Webcasts this year.
Uncommon procedures in a range of specialties were chosen for the UAB Insight-LIVE Webcast series, presented by the UAB Health System, to give physicians and the general public an opportunity to see innovative techniques at UAB’s new facilities. Online viewers were allowed to submit e-mail questions directly to the operating theater for an on-camera response by the surgical team.
In the first surgical Webcast, UAB general surgeon Ronald H. Clements, M.D., and UAB gastroenterologist Charles M. Wilcox, M.D., opened an obstruction in the bile duct of a patient who had undergone gastric bypass surgery in 2002. The gastric bypass didn’t cause the obstruction, but precluded traditional surgical treatment options.
The second procedure was an innovative laparoscopic colorectal surgery performed by UAB oncologic surgeon Marty Heslin, M.D., and moderated by UAB surgical oncologist J. Pablo Arnoletti, M.D.
The following Webcast showed an abdominoplasty by UAB plastic surgeon John Anastasatos, M.D. This surgery removes excess skin that accumulates after significant weight loss following bariatric surgery.
A fourth Webcast featured UAB vascular surgeon William D. Jordan Jr., M.D., performing surgery on a patient suffering from a thoracic aneurysm—a degeneration of the aorta. The minimally invasive thoracic aortic endograft showcased some of the hospital’s newest surgical technology and operating facilities.
If you missed the original Webcasts, you can still go online to view them at www.health.uab.edu/webcast.