The Kinked Wire

The impact of diversity on finances makes perfect sense when you think of the workforce like a toolbox: Every tool has a purpose and design that makes it optimal for certain jobs. If your toolbox is full of only Phillip’s head screwdrivers, you’ll never be able to work with a flat head screw ... Because we currently have a racially homogeneous workforce, we have one that doesn’t employ the full set of skills, experiences and perspectives needed for a full toolbox.In the audio version of "The business case for diversity in IR"  (Fall 2021 IR Quarterly, pp. 16-17), authors Keith M. Horton, MD, FSIR, and Derek L. West, MD, MS,  explain why diversity in your practice is not only a moral  decision, but a financial one that will strengthen your interventional radiology  practice's bottom line.Read the article (including references and recommended reading).Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

I try to present myself as mild-mannered, quiet and very nice, which wins a lot of battles, but deep inside there’s this fierce sense of “right.” And if there was something I needed to fight for—for the rights of patients or for members—I would go to the mat for them. —Katharine L. Krol, MD, FSIR As part of the new "Owning Success" column in SIR's IR Quarterly magazine, guest host Nishita Kothary, MD, FSIR, speaks with a panel of four past SIR Gold Medalists—Anne C. Roberts, MD, FSIR; Katharine L. Krol, MD, FSIR; Jeanne M. Laberge, MD, FSIR; and John  A. Kaufman, MD, FSIR—about what inspires them, obstacles they've overcome and more.Read the related article.Note: This episode was recorded on  Oct. 18, 2021.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

With ever-evolving technologies, cancer treatments will almost certainly become more effective and less invasive in the future. A new procedure that will likely play an important role in the future of interventional oncology is histotripsy. While the procedure could be adopted by a variety of specialties, we believe that interventional oncologists are well-positioned and best equipped to lead the introduction and clinical translation of this new technology.In the audio version of "Breaking down histotripsy: Inside a new ablation modality with cancer applications"  (Fall 2021 IR Quarterly, pp. 12-14), authors Fred T. Lee, MD, Timothy J. Ziemlewicz, MD, Zhen Xu, PhD, and Paul Laeseke MD, PhD, describe the potential for histotripsy in cancer treatment and the critical role interventional oncologists will play. Read the article. Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

With an increasing number of geriatric patients seeking IR services, identification of patients at higher risk for complications will allow for improved pre-procedural counseling and patient selection, as well as targeted application of resources to improve the perioperative risk profile for select patients.In the audio version of "Patient frailty and IR: The case for frailty as a geriatric diagnostic tool" (Fall 2021 IR Quarterly, pp. 20-22), authors Rana Rabei, MD, MHA, and Maureen P. Kohi, MD, FSIR, describe the pathophysiology of patient frailty, how frailty can be measured, and the potential role of frailty in guiding treatment decisions within interventional radiology.Read the article.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

What I wanted to do is really focus in on physicians, because I feel like we're sometimes not the ones in the forefront in making decisions in how healthcare is going ... and it's not our fault. It's because we kind of weren't taught leadership skills. —Elsie Koh, MDWarren Krackov, MD, FSIR, speaks with interventional radiologist Elsie Koh, MD, about her physician leadership training company, her experience as chief medical officer (CMO) of a nationwide healthcare provider, and about the new SIR Women in Interventional Radiology (WIR) Section's Dream Big Book Club Program. Note: This episode was recorded on  Sept. 11, 2021.Related resourcesSIR Women in Interventional Radiology (WIR) Section homepageWIR Dream Big Book Club ProgramDr. Koh's leadership training company, LEAD PhysicianContact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

While I do understand that there may be this idea out there, that the OBL is some magical place, the truth is that I think the ideal scenario is what I have—which is practicing on both sides of the street, so to speak. Because they each pose their own challenges and they each have their own benefits. —Bret Wiechmann, MD, FSIRWarren Krackov, MD, FSIR, speaks with interventional radiologist Bret Wiechmann, MD, FSIR, about how he launched his office-based laboratory (OBL), how other IRs might do the same, and the prospects for trainees to enter this space. Note: This episode was recorded on  July 20, 2021.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

Dialysis, stroke, peripheral arterial disease, oncology, …these affect patients of all races. We know there are health care inequities—Black and Brown patients, and poor patients, uninsured tend to be afflicted more. We can recruit the best and the brightest students across the country and across the world to be part of the greatest specialty in all of medicine—and that’s image-guided medicine.—Vishal Kumar, MDWarren Krackov, MD, FSIR, speaks with interventional radiologist Vishal Kumar, MD, FSIR, about educating medical students about IR, the importance of fostering diversity, and how the two intersect with the SIR Foundation Grants for the Education of Medical Students (GEMS) Program.Related resources Learn more about the GEMS ProgramRead "The macro effects of Microaggressions" (IR Quarterly, Spring 2021)Note: This episode was recorded on  July 29, 2021.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

When we show each other these extreme cases, there's a lot of cheering and high-fiving. That's a really fun part of IR, but that is not what is going to advance the field in the eyes of our referring physicians, or of the public, or of the payers, or of the government.—Daniel Y. Sze, MD, PhD, FSIRWarren Krackov, MD, FSIR, speaks with interventional radiologist Daniel Y. Sze, MD, PhD, FSIR, about his role as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Vascular and Interventional Radiology (JVIR), the increasing importance of evidence-based interventional radiology, and the ways an IR can get involved in research and published in the journal.Related JVIR resources Visit the journal's homepage, jvir.orgRead Dr. Sze's introductory editorial in the January 2021 issue of JVIRRead an IR Quarterly interview with Dr. SzeNote: This episode was recorded on  June 20, 2021.SIR thanks Guerbet, LLC, for its support of this episode.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

I think we’re really at the tip of the iceberg. I think this is very early—in my mid stage of the career, I will probably not be practicing as this evolves into something that’s the full standard of care in multiple joints. But outside of BPH, this is probably the biggest and probably most impactful change I think we’ll see in the embolization space in the next 10 years.—Sandeep Bagla, MDWarren Krackov, MD, FSIR, speaks with interventional radiologist Sandeep Bagla, MD, about the prospects for genicular artery embolization to help patients with osteoarthritis of the knee, the state of research in this promising treatment, and how interventional radiologists might get involved.Related resources from the Society of Interventional Radiology:Read Dr. Bagla's paper, "Genicular artery embolization for the treatment of knee pain secondary to osteoarthritis" (Journal of Vascular and Interventional Radiology,  Dec. 16, 2019)Read Dr. Bagla's article, "Genicular artery embolization: The future standard of care for inflammatory conditions" (a special preview of "New Horizons in Interventional Radiology," supplement to IR Quarterly, April 30, 2021)Note: This episode was recorded on  April 25, 2021.SIR thanks Guerbet, LLC, for its support of this episode.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show

The CPT code may have certain required elements, and if you don’t put all of those in the report, you don’t get credit for doing the procedure. Or if the coders go ahead and code it, you could get audited later. So if someone goes to jail for fraudulent coding, you’ll be on the line as well as the coder, as the interventional radiologist—because you are ultimately responsible for what you bill.—Katharine L. Krol, MD, FSIRWarren Krackov, MD, FSIR, speaks with interventional radiologist Katharine L. Krol, MD, FSIR, about how interventional radiologists can make sure that they’re getting appropriately reimbursed and what SIR has done to fight Medicare cuts.Related resources from the Society of Interventional Radiology:Value of IR white paper2021 Interventional Radiology Coding UpdateValue of IR toolkitSIR 2021 annual meeting session (March 22, 2021): Standing Up for IR: Conveying our value and moving the field forwardNote: This episode was recorded on  March 13, 2021.SIR thanks Boston Scientific for its support of this episode.Contact us with your ideas and questions, or read more about about interventional radiology in IR Quarterly magazine or SIR's Patient Center.(c) Society of Interventional Radiology.Support the show