Time to Innovate, Validate, Educate

By Scott C. Goodwin, MD, FSIR 

SIR President 

Summer 2013

Establishing the value of interventional radiology—which incorporates value development, value continuance and value evaluation/validation—is critically important. How do we advance interventional radiology and show the specialty’s value?  

SIR must make an investment in innovation. We must incessantly and persistently work to improve our field. Innovation is a key component of the continued success of interventional radiology—present at the beginning of our field and still much in evidence as we celebrate SIR’s 40th anniversary. We must consider how SIR can inspire, cultivate and promote innovation to improve and revolutionize patient care by inventing new image-guided treatments for the benefit of our patients. Under our new strategic plan, SIR and SIR Foundation, which specializes in developing investigators trained in conducting pivotal basic and clinical research trials, are working synergistically to develop and promote future IR innovations.

We must focus on validation. Once we invent a new technique (or a new feature of an existing technique), we need to demonstrate that it’s safe and effective, and the SIR Foundation funds research that supports this validation process. We are working with the FDA and different payers regarding what are their requirements to consider a device or treatment safe and effective. Our emphasis is on comparative effectiveness research, and SIR is validating data. For more than two years, the Society has proactively addressed an FDA medical alert about retrievable IVC filters. The society’s action resulted in a collaborative initiative with the Society for Vascular Surgery: The development of the five-year soon-to-be-launched PRESERVE study and the formation of its related IVC Filter Study Group Foundation. In the future, we will need to validate emerging treatments, such as embolization of the prostate for BPH (PAE) and renal denervation for the treatment of hypertension, which could impact millions of patients. The SIR Foundation organized an international expert panel meeting in PAE and plans one on renal denervation. 

We must recognize that validation requires evolving education. As new treatments are proven to be safe and effective, we seek to educate you about them. Intra-arterial therapy for stroke has been around for more than 15 years at the largest medical centers, yet it is not available in many community hospitals. Part of the reason is that there are not enough specialists to provide stroke care for all the patients in this country. There is a subset of IRs strongly interested in stroke treatment. The Society has provided training that gives individuals a good first step toward being able to do this type of work. We must continue to emphasize that we are clinical practitioners. After many years of work, we have a dual primary certificate in IR and DR, which will play an important role in ensuring the education of trainees not only in the full gamut of radiology and IR but also in the importance of longitudinal care. 

At April’s successful Annual Scientific Meeting in New Orleans, we shared ideas with friends and colleagues, and we came home with best practices to implement in our own practices—all while “Reaching Out.” SIR is actively reaching out to our colleagues in international societies, recognizing that we must collaborate to innovate, validate and educate the field together—across geographical boundaries.  As we become more secure in the value of our specialty, we need to make sure the world understands that value. This value education needs to be made to patients, referring physicians, hospital administrators, payers, government regulators, legislators and others.

It is an honor to serve as your president. Throughout my entire professional life I’ve been involved with SIR, and I encourage you to volunteer with the Society. Together, we see the value of IR and its continued promise in raising the quality of medical care for patients. Together, we must innovate, validate and educate to achieve excellence.