Dr. Syan shares her thoughts on SUFU 2024

In this video, Raveen Syan, MD, FPMRS, shares her thoughts on the 2024 Society of Urodynamics, Female Pelvic Medicine & Urogenital Reconstruction Winter Meeting. Syan is an assistant professor in clinical urology at the University of Miami Desai Sethi Urology Institute in Miami, Florida.

Transcription:

SUFU in 24 was another great meeting. The best thing about SUFU is always that you see the young trainees really start to build their skills as speakers and presenting their research. I was moderating the fellows forum, and [there is] really great research coming out of these different institutions. You really see rising stars. [It's] so wonderful to see young trainees getting engaged in the world of urogynecology and pelvic reconstruction. A lot of what they were focusing on were things like quality-of-life outcomes, or outcomes related to new innovations, such as new implantable tibial devices. That was really exciting. It's always good to see the emerging young doctors succeed and have interest. It was very interesting to hear about all these new implantable tibial devices and hear how well they're doing. What's interesting is they're all slightly nuanced, so I think as a provider, it will be a journey to figure out what I would recommend the most, what I think is best for the patient. But at the end of the day, it's nice to have a tailored approach and options available for the individual patient. Other things that stood out to me at the talk [included] the basic science component at SUFU. It starts off the course. It's always great for someone who's not a basic scientist like myself, to hear a really good summary, which is what was done on Friday morning. It was really interesting to hear that apparently umbrella cells are the new hot cell of the bladder, and I am excited to hear more about that, and how that may influence the physiology of the bladder and bladder symptoms. It was also a great hotel; they chose an excellent spot in beautiful Fort Lauderdale. And at the end of the meetings, a lot of us would meet at night, and it was just a great way to interact on an informal level and continue to build our networking and collaboration. It's a really important thing to create that interfacing; that's how new research [and] new ideas are formulated. One of the very interesting talks was the SOTA Lecture, where Dr. Andrew C. Peterson describes the end stage bladder, and it's always great to hear from experts and experienced clinicians about how they handle these very difficult cases. And I think that's one of the things SUFU does best, which is showcase these challenging, difficult-to-treat situations and really helps contextualize it. He did a great job of explaining how should we define the end stage bladder? Because that's a little vague. And then how do we talk to patients about it, and most importantly, what do patients have to say? And he shared a beautiful video by a patient who talked about how difficult that decision was to do some major surgery and how incredibly impactful in a positive way undergoing that surgery was. So it was great to hear, as a younger clinician, how others talk to patients, how patients do, how do we face these difficult challenges. SUFU is a fantastic organization where they're very much focused on partnership between all stages of your career: research, clinical care, outcomes. And SUFU really leads the nation in terms of defining urogynecologic problems and how we should treat [them] expertly with care and with attention to what's important to patients. It's a meeting I look forward to every year because I learn so much. I have the opportunity, I feel, to share what I am learning and every time I leave the meeting, I just feel reinvigorated, refreshed, and excited about this field that we're a part of.

This transcription was edited for clarity.