São Paulo – A group with at least 20 Brazilian experts from the medical field, mostly doctors, will present their studies, expertise and practices at the 23rd World Congress of the International Federation for the Surgery of Obesity and Metabolic Disorders (IFSO), from September 26 to 29, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
Brazilian doctor Almino Ramos (picture above) will begin, in Dubai, his term as IFSO’s president. The international organization gathers 62 countries and over eight thousand surgeons dedicated to the study and treatment of obesity through many interventions: surgical, endoscopic or balloon placement.
IFSO holds its congress every year, all around the world, as a forum for experts to share and exchange their knowledge on surgical treatment of very obese patients. New techniques, researches and concepts in the field are presented. The last editions gathered, on average, 2,500 people, Ramos told ANBA.
In this year’s program, which is available online at IFSO’s website, are doctors and researchers from the United States, Lebanon, France, Germany, Taiwan, Spain, India, Argentina, UAE, UK, Belgium, Canada, Kuwait, Jordan, Bahrain, Australia, Italy, Qatar, Egypt, Singapore, China, Portugal, Japan, among others.
The number of Brazilian experts speaking in the congress stand out. The country is the number two worldwide in number of bariatric surgeries with 110,000 procedures last year. According to Ramos, 54% of the population is overweight.
“Brazil has a comprehensive legislation in the field, it acknowledges obesity as a disease and bariatric surgery as a technique for the super obese,” explained the doctor. A norm by the National Regulatory Agency for Private Health Insurance and Plans (ANS), linked to the Ministry of Health, states that super obese people have the right to surgery.
Brazil is a scientific and research reference in bariatric surgery and welcomes foreign doctors for training, plus foreign experts always come to the country for the annual congress of the Brazilian Society of Bariatric and Metabolic Surgery (SBCBM). Almino Ramos believes that all these factors explain the country’s standout position in the field and the strong participation in IFSO’s congress.
According to the doctor, among the highlights of IFSO 2018 World Congress will be the bariatric surgery to improve the conditions of patients with high blood pressure, diabetes, sleep apnea, high triglycerides, orthopedic conditions, among others, and the use of increasingly less invasive techniques, such as laparoscopy and endoscopy.
To participate as speakers in the congress, the doctors must register and wait for an analysis by a commission, or they can speak as guests by the federation, which is the case of most of Brazilian doctors in this year’s edition, said Ramos.
IFSO’s incoming president will discuss many topics in the event, among them less invasive bariatric surgeries. Among other topics set to be discussed by Brazilian doctors are sleeve gastrectomy, endoscopic bariatric therapies, robotic and the future of bariatric and metabolic procedures, bariatric surgery and hypertension, effects of surgery for non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), among others.
According to the program released by IFSO, among the Brazilian doctors set to speak in Dubai are João Caetano Marchesini, Ricardo Cohen, Carlos Schiavon, Sergio Santoro, Manoel Galvão Neto, Alexander Morell, Nestor Suguitani Bertin, Marcos Leão Vilas Boas, Luciana El-Kadre and João Sucupira. Brazilian experts of other fields will also speak at the congress, such as nutritionist Silvia Leite Faria and the Physical Education expert Emilian Rejane Marcon.
Almino Ramos, who will lead IFSO until the organization’s next world congress in 2019, graduated in Medical School at University of Caxias do Sul (UCS), has a master’s degree in Surgery at State University of Campinas (UNICAMP) and a doctor’s degree in Surgery at Federal University of Pernambuco (UFPE). He works at private practice Gastro Obeso Center, in Sâo Paulo, and was the president of SBCBM in 2013 and 2014.
Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
