Surgery Abroad: A trip to New Orleans with the American Society of Plastic Surgeons

In October I was awarded a travel bursary by BAPRAS to present my research “The effect of perforator number and location on the flow and perfusion of zone 4 skin and fat of DIEP flaps” at the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) meeting, after presenting the same paper at our summer meeting. Registering was easy – I joined ASPS as an international trainee for $150, which meant free meeting registration and online access to PRS.

My registrar colleague Daniel Saleh, also presenting at ASPS, travelled with me from Manchester and my Canniesburn boss and research supervisor Mr Iain Mackay joined us in New Orleans, where we were hit by the heat, local friendliness and the volume of jazz played from every man-made structure. The ASPS meeting was held in the Ernest N. Morial convention centre – 1.1 million square feet of exhibition space packed with plastic surgeons, reps and the most flamboyantly decorated exhibitions imaginable. Surgeons mainly hailed from the USA, however the plastic surgery community is an incestuous one and as well as new friends, old friends from as far as Bahrain were met!

The meeting comprised of five days (6am-7pm) packed full of educational seminars (free for trainees to attend), instructional presentations and large video-screened debates by renowned experts – some seminars I attended were led by Fu-Chan Wei, Mark Constantian and Sidney Coleman. Some differences in practice were evident in the teaching sessions, for example the less selective and very widespread use of canthal support during routine blepharoplasty. Research presentations made up surprisingly small amounts of each day and though American research presentations were of a similar standard and displayed similar levels of nerves as our home-grown variety, some discernable differences included a disappointing proportion of papers on implant-based breast reconstructions – with reference to the fact that this was in part due to remuneration considerations.

Social events included a free residents drinks reception (not as well-attended as those in the UK) and a tour of the carnival storage facility with a band and swanky free food and drink. For $200 you could attend an ‘intimate evening’ with country singer Jewel, though we decided to spend this money on good wine, soft-shell crab po-boy sandwiches, fish gumbo and lobster. Actually, I should say Mr Mackay decided to spend this money; the financial benefits of being a trainee persist even abroad.

We went shopping for antique curiosities in the French Quarter, pork-pie jazz hats in town and gifts along Esplanade whilst sampling amazing food, whether in a 5* restaurant or the pulled pork sandwich from the roadside deli. Our evenings were filled with good restaurants, classy and not-so-classy bars in the French Quarter and excellent live music from a Donegal band in a traditional Irish pub. Hurricane Sandy delayed our return flight for two days, though being stuck in New Orleans was not a huge hardship and being upgraded to first class softened the blow.

I had not previously attended an International Plastic Surgery meeting and the money awarded to me by BAPRAS helped make it possible. An international meeting is a chance to showcase your unit and country, disseminate your research to a different audience, embrace all the location has to offer and meet fellow international trainees. I will definitely be repeating this experience.

​Helen Douglas