SAGES Member Spotlight

Dr. Jenny Shao joined SAGES as a candidate member when she was a 3^rd year resident applying for an MIS fellowship. She remembers submitting her first abstract in 2018 in Seattle and her impressions of the meeting as “friendly and supportive. I loved how everyone was not afraid to be themselves and built connections outside of rank, institution, and other superficial metrics. It’s the conference I look forward to most every year.”

As a full-time member now, SAGES is the group Dr. Shao feels most connected to in terms of mission, clinical content, and people, drawn most to its spirit of innovation and focus on evidence-based medicine and changing preconceived notions of surgery. She adds, “I feel that SAGES is at the forefront of both surgical technique and surgical culture change.”

Dr. Shao has served on several SAGES committees, most currently on Communications, Conflict of Interest, and Diversity, Leadership, and Professional Development (DLPD) Committees. Through the support of the DLPD committee and SAGES leadership, she was able to apply and obtain an ACS Grant funding her  Fundamentals of Leadership Development (FLD) work.

FLD is an interactive, problem-solving, leadership curriculum for surgeons looking to develop leadership skills centered around increasing the pipeline of diversity in surgical leadership, creating opportunities for healthcare equity, and DEI conflict resolution and negotiation at their institutions/organizations. The curriculum earns leaders a Fundamentals of Leadership Development Certificate as well as CME credit. To participate, go to https://www.sages.org/fld-sign-up/  for more information.

The “list goes on and on” when it comes to Dr. Shao’s SAGES friends and mentors and includes: Drs. Todd Heniford and Vedra Augenstein, Drs. Dana Telem, Alia Quereshi, Juliane Bingener-Casey, Courtney Collins, Ruchir Puri, Yewande Alimi, and SAGES Exec for believing in the importance of the FLD Curriculum!

Through this group and the entire SAGES community, Dr. Shao says she’s gotten to know an incredible group of passionate, down to earth, innovative, talented and fun people who care deeply about advancing knowledge, innovation/technology, and culture – and who she looks forward to reconnecting with every year at the annual meeting (pictured riding the mechanical bull in Denver is a particularly fun memory).

“SAGES has provided me with many opportunitie to advance in my career and develop as a clinician, researcher, and leader. I hope to continue to learn from the organization and my colleagues so I can continue to grow as a surgeon, a leader, and a person.”

These days, Dr. Shao is also finding more time to spend with her family and do the things she loves outside of surgery, including reading (a self-described “book nerd, she was married in a library), working with her hands on DIY projects (big surprise as a surgeon!) and trying new outdoor activities, including skiing and golf.

As a trauma surgeon, Dr. Ron Barbosa is an outlier given SAGES’ mostly MIS and general surgery membership.

Still, unlike more specialty heavy societies, Dr. Barbosa values his membership in a society that is more general and practical – and with annual meetings and sessions that he says, “have a very high percentage of me paying attention.”

He adds, “SAGES does a good job of recognizing that much of its population are non-university people and allowing non-academic surgeons to have input.”

In addition to the annual meeting, Dr. Barbosa also says that he often looks to SAGES online educational videos (https://www.sages.org/video/) when he needs help with a case he doesn’t do. He also points to the value of reaching out to follow SAGES surgeons, including friends like Drs. Eric Knauer and Vahagn Nikolian.

As a member of SAGES Acute Care Surgery Committee, Dr. Barbosa is working on getting a white paper published and helping establish the committee’s Facebook presence. After 24 years as a trauma surgeon, Dr. Barbosa says the goal is to “get trauma surgeons more familiar with MIS, and MIS surgeons more familiar with acute care goals.”

Outside of the OR, the father of four has an active presence on Twitter/X where you can follow him @rbarbosa91.

As a SAGES member, Dr. Eleanor Fung says, “I don’t feel alone when I’m practicing, and know there are members in other cities I can count on.”

This sense of community—whether it’s at the annual meeting, cross country and even during the pandemic—is, by far, the most common thread among SAGES members, and the one that Dr. Fung agrees continues to set SAGES apart from other societies. “There’s a cohesiveness that you don’t get with any other society,” she says, “along with the ability to access a wide variety of opinions, and informally discuss and bounce ideas off each other, including with those who’ve trained you.”

For Dr. Fung, this includes Dr. Steven Schwaitzberg, who she met at SAGES 2016 and credits as one of her mentors and the person who initially hired her and was responsible for getting her involved on committees. She is currently co-chair of the Flexible Endoscopy and Educational Resources committees, and one of the SAGES representatives for the Fellowship Council Accreditation Committee. Dr. Fung was previously involved in both Resident & Fellow Training and the Technology Council.

Dr. Fung earned her bachelor’s and medical degrees and did her residency training in general surgery at the University of Toronto. She completed her fellowship at Ohio State’s Wexner Medical Center in 2016. Today, Dr. Fung is a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Surgery at the University of Buffalo.

Through the university, Dr. Fung also serves as one of the chairs for SAGES annual Flexible Endoscopy Course for Fellows, which rotates among different cities each year. She was the chair of the SAGES Flexible Endoscopy Course for Fellows in 2021 in Buffalo, and also helped co-chair several endoscopy courses for the ACS (American College of Surgeons) Clinical Congress.

In addition to participating in courses, Dr. Fung encourages her residents and fellows to attend SAGES annual meetings. In addition to serving on committees, she plans to continue to teach the next generation of surgeons.

From academia to the military to community practice (to being a father of five), Dr. Yong Choi literally has a world of experience as a surgeon.

Dr. Choi’s wide range of experience extends to his participation on several committees since joining SAGES as a fellow in 2005. Current chair of the Continuing Education committee, he has also served on the Metabolic and Bariatric and Community Practice committee, the Education Council, and worked with Dr. Rob Lim as co-chair on the initial Military “Working Group,” now the Military committee.

When he retired as a colonel after serving 21 years as a military surgeon, Dr. Choi says, “I really enjoyed growing that group and appreciate SAGES support for the creation of that committee.  The support SAGES has given to military medicine has been nothing short of amazing.”

Dr. Choi, who moved from Korea to Houston at age six, considers himself a native Texan. A graduate of the Military Academy at West Point and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Dr. Choi did his residency at Dwight D. Eisenhower Army Medical Center in Augusta, Georgia.  After four years as a General Surgeon, he completed a Minimally Invasive fellowship at Baylor under program director Dr. John Sweeney, who encouraged him to join SAGES and who he still considers a mentor.

During his military career, Dr. Choi served as the Commander of the Forward Surgical Team at Fort Hood and was on the teaching faculty at Dwight Eisenhower Army Medical Center at Fort Gordon in Augusta Georgia. He’s also been to the Middle East four times, including both Afghanistan and Iraq, and says “caring for members of the military and their families has been some of the most rewarding work of my career.”

Now a Chief Medical Officer at St. Luke’s Health-The Woodlands Hospital in Texas, Dr. Choi gave a talk at the 2019 SAGES meeting about the transition from academic to community practice surgery.

Acknowledging the more fun aspects of SAGES meetings, Dr. Choi has also managed to ride two mechanical bulls (without injuring himself) during Main Events. One of the avid golfer’s more safe athletic goals is to “try to play golf in every state.”