Next Leaders in Bariatric Surgery

When the idea came up for this editorial, it was so clear that this topic was right and no further discussion was needed. The journal wants to recognize some of the rising women leaders in bariatric surgery we should all be following. This is not to forget the work of leaders such as Robin Blackstone, Leena Khaitan, Rory Pryor, Cori McBride, Christine Ren-Fielding, Marina Kurian, Anita Courcoulas, and more, but as I scan the conference rooms, follow the lecture circuit, and hear trainees talk about their mentors, it is not hard to spot these rising leaders among us.

In my own shop is Jahnavi Srinivasan from Emory. She is talented with pretty much anything in the gastrointestinal tract, doing some of the finest minimally invasive colitis work I know. Turn the laparoscope cephalad and she continues to add to her several hundred bariatric cases. There are numerous patients who will forever be grateful to be alive and working because she reconstructed their abdominal walls and re-established intestinal continuity after bariatric operations gone horribly wrong elsewhere.

At the Oregon Health & Sciences University is Farah Hussain, who is Chief of Bariatric and Metabolic Surgery. Her experience in bariatric surgery really started while she was a staff surgeon for the United States Army. She was able to build a bariatric surgical unit in Denver before leading the program in Portland. A patient advocate at the core, you should hear her lectures. She showed me how to extract gastric sleeve remnants transorally that I had a chance to demonstrate on a trip to the Middle East. ¹

At Dartmouth-Hitchcock in Lebanon, New Hampshire is Sarah Billmeier who has used her expertise in health outcomes research to mentor trainees on articles and presentations.

Dana Telem at the University of Michigan is a health services research expert who is one of the most prolific investigators in our field, doing work that has high impact on entire populations. In addition to her technical work on bariatric surgery outcomes, her perspective on transformational narratives to change behavior toward women surgeons was part of the impetus for this editorial. ²

Meredith Duke in her short time at UNC-Chapel Hill has already established herself as a teacher and mentor. Her article on the effects of education and health literacy on bariatric surgery patients is worth a read. ³

Sabrena Noria at Ohio State in Columbus and Sarah Martin del Campo at Swedish in Seattle have put their career efforts in understanding care coaching, women issues in bariatric surgery, as well as novel endoscopic approaches to treat obesity and managing complications. ⁴

Pearl Ma who is part of the oldest bariatric surgical group in UC-Fresno has frequently described novel approaches to revision surgery, thinking “outside the box” for creative solutions when patients present with complex issues.

At Duke, Kunoor Jain-Spangler draws from her global experience with Indian parents and fluency in Spanish to focus on women's health and minority issues as they relate to bariatric surgical care.

This is an incomplete list, but it is the beginning of proper recognition. It is necessary to know that some of the leading bariatric surgeons in the world are women, and better yet, there are more on the horizon.