The 67th Annual PostGraduate Assembly in Anesthesiology (PGA) was held over the weekend of December 13-17, 2013 in New York City at the Marriott Marquis hotel. The PGA is the annual meeting of the New York State Society of Anesthesiologists (NYSSA), and is one of the largest meetings for anesthesiologists both nationally and internationally. This year, in addition to the normal program, the PGA hosted the annual meeting to the New York
State Conference for Anesthesiology Residents and Fellows (NYSCARF). This was the fifth meeting of the NYSCARF and the second to be held alongside the PGA, in order to provide residents and fellows a greater opportunity to interact with the members of NYSSA in attendance and experience the numerous educational opportunities afforded by the conference.
The NYSCARF meeting was held on Saturday, December 14, throughout the day at the Marriott. The meeting featured morning sessions with both presentations and posters and an early afternoon workshop on regional anesthesia and ultrasound.
In mid-afternoon, the meeting moved on to the Resident Research Showcase, a poster discussion session chaired by Weill Cornell's Kane Pryor, MD, and held on the Marriott's 16th-floor Sky Lobby. The poster presentations were divided into four sessions, moderated by anesthesiologists from Montefiore, NYU, St. Luke's-Roosevelt, Mount Sinai, SUNY-Downstate, and Weill Cornell. The moderators from Weill Cornell Anesthesiology were Mary Casciano, MD; Franklin Chiao, MD; Milica Markovic, MD; and Alex Proekt, MD. Sessions focused on pain management; critical care and physiology; surgical outcomes; and cases reports and education-based research.
Weill Cornell residents were well-represented among the participants. They were:
- Eric Cheon, MD (Resident, 2014)
- James Littlejohn, MD (Resident, 2014)
- Mary So, MD (Resident, 2015)-poster presented by Mohammed Piracha, MD (Resident, 2015)
- Zachary Turnbull, MD (Resident, 2015)
- Rajiv Shah, MD (Resident, 2014)
- Ansara Vaz, MD (Resident, 2017)
With New York City in the midst of a winter storm, and snow and wind pelting the tourists just outside the Marriott in Times Square, the NYSCARF participants found a warm academic refuge in the Sky Lobby. The entire poster presentation was well-attended, with over 100 people both witnessing and participating in the sessions. Attendees included many Weill Cornell faculty and fellows, including Anesthesiology Chair Hugh Hemmings, MD, PhD; Cynthia Lien, MD (Chair of the NYSSA Committee on Academic Anesthesiology); and Peter Fleischut, MD. The NYSCARF sessions were an important part of the Weill Cornell faculty's active participation in the 2013 PGA.
POSTERS PRESENTED BY WEILL CORNELL ANESTHESIOLOGY RESIDENTS AT NYSCARF POSTER SESSION (Dec. 14, 2013)
Eric Cheon
- Evaluation of anesthesiology services after 5PM: strategizing a staffing model to meet increased demand
James Littlejohn
- Implementation of alert in the electronic medical record reduces incidence of non-OR blood transfusions for Hb>8.0g/dL
- National assessment of practice patterns in unanticipated failures of direct laryngoscopy
Rajiv Shah
- Understanding and attitudes of pain medicine in third-year medical students: a pilot study on pain education curriculum
- Sacral hiatus approach and 3-D mapping for sacral spinal cord simulation in the treatment of intractable chronic pain
- The use of once-daily G-GR (Gralise) in difficult to treat postherpetic neuralgia
Mary So (presented by Mohammed Piracha)
- Medically challenging case: hyperfibrinolysis after sudden operative hemorrhage
Zachary Turnbull
- Streamlining electronic anesthetic records to patient's electronic medical record and the impact on cost
- Effects of real-time data integration technology on compliance with postoperative documentation
Ansara Vaz
- Multidisciplinary approach to developing a protocol for safe OR management of a patient with a history of sulfite anaphylaxis
More Information
NYSSA-PGA website