I have 10-15 minutes to share with you some things about the Traveling Fellowship, but honestly there is no way that I can really express to you what a wonderful experience this was. Far beyond my imagination and really you may get a chance to meet some of them, but really six of the finest young men that you'll ever get a chance to meet and spend time with and so it was really a treat for me to be part of it. We had a bigger group this year again because we carried over and I'll get to the hosts in a second, but it's just a fantastic experience and I encourage all of you to take every chance you can to look at your schedules. It's not always easy to take up to two weeks or 10-12 days off, but it's well worth it. I think to a man, each of the six fellows would tell you that and the other thing is I would say be persistent. One of our fellows, it was the third time applying and some things happen and you never quite know what, but certainly don't stop if things don't work out any particular year. It's worth the experience and please reapply because I think you'll agree once you've finished that it was well worth it. So I'm just going to share some of the experiences. This is the crew, the batting order, sporting their Anna Traveling Fellow coats and needing some coffee in the morning to get started and I'll get to what they needed in the evening to go to bed. So why would you take nearly two weeks out of your practice to do a traveling fellowship? Well, one of the things is that you'll develop lifelong friendships. These gentlemen just in the short course of two weeks really developed keen friendships, just goes beyond just friendships with their fellows. These men will get to know each other's families, some of them, they'll get to even know their kids and whatnot and speaking from experience with colleagues that I've had, these friendships will grow over a lifetime and they'll enrich your lives as well. You'll have shared academic interests and there'll be occasions where you'll start talking about a problem that's unsolved and you'll get together and you'll come up with a study design and you'll begin working together on some things. So two of our gentlemen were involved particularly in hip arthroscopy and it wouldn't surprise me if they do some work together. So that can really be a plus for you and you can assist each other. Somebody will be on a committee and have the opportunity to invite one of their fellow members from the fellowship. So this is sort of the rundown, not exactly a poster picture but supporting their crew. So this is relationships that again begin not always just inside the OR and academically but heading out for one of our first hikes. Again, not quite a calendar picture but a nice group. So this is what I was mentioning before. It was coffee needed to get them up and like my kids at home, they refuse to go to bed without ice cream every night. So this was, actually Costas probably was the leader but no one refused the ice cream. So relationship with hosts, these are incredibly valuable opportunities. These hosts, whether you identify them as such or not, will become mentors or can become mentors, particularly if they are in your particular field of interest. They can guide you. They can give you suggestions in terms of research. You can send them actual designs, study designs and get comments and whatnot. So these relationships can be incredibly valuable. Study participation, I just want to give you one example. One of our fellows, Adnan, was a British traveling fellow, basically like the Arthroscopy Association, met a mentor in Lyon, France and subsequent to that has published over 50 papers simply from meeting him in a traveling fellowship, hitting it off, having common interests and has produced a huge volume of very valuable information for the literature. And so those are really key relationships and leadership involvement as well. They will guide you in terms of your career development, et cetera. So these are some of our friends from San Antonio. This was a San Antonio Military Medical Center group, incredible hosts and really enriched our experience. This is Dr. Burkhart at his ranch house describing his trophies and Matt Preventer with Luke McDonald really enjoying each other and developing a great friendship. Tom DeBardino with Ben Graves and really a great time in the evening together. So what about surgical observation? Well, the host cases obviously are very valuable. They provide opportunities to discuss indications, contraindications, how to stay away from pitfalls, et cetera, and rehabilitation strategies after the surgeries between cases, a lot of dialogue between the fellows and the hosts in terms of how and why, tips and tricks and whatnot that we'll get to in a second. And, you know, how do they guide these rehabilitation strategies, when can they get patients back and some real valuable information. So this is Dr. McCarty doing a Bankart repair with some bony loss and a beautiful demonstration of a rump massage technique. This is Dr. Hartzler, who is here with us, and Rob is also sharing pearls that we found very valuable, probably nobody greater than Rob took time out of his practice to spend time with the fellows, dialogue, et cetera. This is one of his partners, Dr. DeBardino, and again discussing critical issues as far as Tom had a very nice demonstration of a posterolateral bundle reconstruction, just a single bundle reconstruction of the ACL and how, why, how did he suspect it, techniques he uses so he doesn't ruin the residual portion of the graph. So very, very valuable. And then surgical techniques, Tom had excellent little pearls in terms of how he places his guide for only a single bundle repair. All of those tips and pearls are extraordinarily valuable and you'll be able to take those back to practice. This was a lab session we had and actually Robbie Westerman, one of our fellows, shared a great technique with a step cut in terms of his proximal tibial osteotomies that was a huge pearl and everybody really appreciated that insight. And I think there's one a little bit later here, I think it was Luke maybe, but somebody dubbed this the Godfather Knot. We were talking about a knot that I've used in practice for a long time that has some utility and so practicing, talking about, again, tips, tricks, pearls, et cetera. And then, of course, wisdom. When you give your presentations, it can be incredibly valuable because they'll give you very, very good feedback, you know, what was strong, they'll ask you questions and challenge you about parts of your presentation, parts of your research that were weaker, and it gives you a great opportunity to make your presentation stronger, to enhance your research. They'll recommend directions, hey, have you thought about this? These are some opportunities, these are some questions that we haven't solved yet. They'll talk about how I grew my practice. Everybody wants to know, you know, this is a tough time, how do I grow my practice, whether that's private, whether that's in an academic setting, et cetera. People like Matt Preventer, who's been around to several different practice scenarios, has great insight in terms of what it takes to grow a practice in different environments. And then they can also talk about, particularly in a private setting, and many ANA members are in a private setting, how do you balance research and still have an active and viable practice? And that's not always an easy thing, but those insights can be incredibly valuable. So this is Matt sharing with the fellows, it happens to be Ben Graves, but sharing with the fellows what it was like for him to bounce from Boston to Vail, et cetera, and the challenges that he met and how he overcame them. This is Rob again, Bob Hartzler, and again, Rob was extraordinarily generous with his time and insights, and I would tell you that the fellows found this time, and we had a great time together in terms of different activities and social activities, but this is the highlight when they can really one-on-one say, hey, Dr. Hartzler, you've been through this, can you share with us what you think? And they were glued to these sessions, very valuable. This is Dr. McCarty in Colorado, again, sharing his OR with us. So mentorship, how is this valuable? These people are all very, very accomplished, and you don't even have to tell them that they're mentors. You'll develop relationships where you can call them up and you can ask them everything about practice, family, et cetera, and they'll be happy to give you whatever guidance they can. They'll share with you how do you advance in academics, whether that be in a formal academic institution or whether that be in private practice, can you these days actually do academics? And I would tell you that in my experience, there probably is not a better organization than ANA with respect to private practice and trying to do some quality academic research, and part of that is because ANA's heritage is basically non-academic people in the sense that it wasn't really from large academic institutions that the people from ANA that got started developed this organization. It was really private practitioners, and so they have a great deal of insight. They'll share with you how to work with industry, innovation, what do you do with your ideas. Steve Burkhardt has a safe with his guns in it and also has the original sketches and drawings of his patents. So he'll share ideas, how do you get some of your ideas moving forward. Maybe they'll get to a patent stage, and then most important probably for all of us, my lovely wife Marguerite's here, but it's not easy for us to maintain a work-life balance, and everybody that you'll visit as a host has had challenges, and I liken it to a wheel that you have to put balance weights on. The only difference is the balance weights aren't fixed, they're sliding. So you have to constantly, every three to six months, reevaluate where you are in your work-life balance because you're probably going to have to make more adjustments. Those weights shift. And so all of these things are of value for you. So these sit-down sessions, this is at Steve's ranch, at Cloud Nine Ranch in San Antonio just outside, and incredibly gracious, and we asked Steve anything and everything and not bashful about sharing challenges and what happened that was beneficial, successful, what didn't work, and whatnot. So these sessions were incredibly valuable. This is Dr. Rachel Frank sharing her insights in terms of research pursuits, et cetera. And this is Dr. Philippon with Dr. Westerman and Dr. Economopoulos, the two who had a bias toward hip arthroscopy. Incredibly generous with his time, Dr. Philippon shared his OR and had great discussions during those times. Leadership, you'll find great examples of leadership for the hosts that will spend time with you. It's already been mentioned by Dr. Cole and others that it's a meritocracy and it's a great organization. If you're willing to roll up your sleeves, there's an opportunity at ANA because there's plenty of work to do, and if you're willing to put the time in, it's a very rewarding experience. They'll give you career guidance in leadership, and you're going to be a leader, whether that's in your healthcare system, whether that's in your practice group, or even in your OR, learning and observing these incredible leadership styles is certainly valuable. This is Dr. Alderique, has had multiple tours in Afghanistan, sharing the perspective of what it's like to care for and manage patients who have had an amputation of one sort or another. Leadership and accountability, things we were exposed to at the facility, great insights for all of us, and again, more sharing with the hosts. This is Dr. Burkhardt's ranch, and his fellows have a path, and each one of those fellows has a plaque with a unique cowboy saying that's reflective of Steve's influence on their careers. So we also had a great deal of fun. This is prior to taking off on a hike with Dr. McCarty in Flatiron Range in Colorado. This is a hot air balloon above Boulder and experiencing a real treat early in the morning. This is our group in Vail, whitewater rafting. Robbie carefully selected his helmet before anybody else could, but a great deal of fun. This is on Dr. Burkhardt's ranch, touring around in the ATVs and getting a chance to see the unique geography of that area. So I would tell you that when we were just starting the Copernicus Initiative about a decade ago now, Howard Sweeney, who's recently passed, sent me this, quote, one of his favorites, and it's become one of mine, and I think it really reflects on the traveling fellow legacy. Everything in the world is passed down. Every piece of knowledge is something that's been shared by someone else. If you understand it as I do, mentoring becomes your true legacy. It's the greatest inheritance you can give to others. It's why you get up in the morning every day to teach and be taught. So the Anna Fellowship is right for you. Pick the time, engage, send in your application, and you won't regret it. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Rick. Rick is a lifelong educator and mentor and friend, and he was a phenomenal choice for Godfather this year. You can ask all the traveling fellows, and I encourage you to speak to them today if you get a chance. It's something that I would encourage all of you to apply for. You'll make lifelong friends and mentors, and I think it's best to do it in your first five or six years of practice, so once you get a couple years under your belt, then consider it and apply.

Traveling Fellowship program

personal experience

lifelong friendships

surgical observation

leadership development