Fellowship News
2016 SICOT International Travelling Fellowship Report
 Jiong Jiong GuoSICOT Associate Member - Suzhou, China |
It was a great honour to go for an overseas training in 2016 as a recipient of the SICOT International Travelling Fellowship. I received one-month training at the Centre Orthopédique Santy, a FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence.
 Dr Guo and Dr Neyton |
The Centre Orthopédique Santy has been known to be a "sacred" place of sports injuries and orthopaedic surgery, attracting many visiting fellows from all around the world. But as the saying goes, "good things never come easy". After a very long delay at the airport because of the weather, I finally arrived at Lyon and the sun was shining. I started off my observation with Dr Neyton on the morning of the second day. At Dr Neyton’s clinic, I learned the flow sheet of out-patient clinics in France and discussed some interesting shoulder cases with him. He is a very kind teacher.
Practice makes perfect. I participated in operations from the second day to the end. I was a little surprised at first to learn that every surgeon would run between two theatres and operate at most about ten cases a day. The OR started at 07:00 in the morning and usually finished in the afternoon, which meant that surgeons and nurses should make good use of every minute. The case load was enormous but they worked very orderly, efficiently, and safely. Like most people with a passion for something, I love shoulder sports and have a genuine interest, studying it exhaustively over many years. Therefore, I enjoyed and cherished the time in the OR tremendously with Drs Lionel Neyton, Arnaud Godenèche, Laurent Nové-Josserand, and Bertrand Sonnery-Cottet. All of them are world masters in the field of shoulder surgery and sports medicine. Throughout my stay, I had the opportunity to see massive rotator cuff repair by a novel patch by Dr Neyton, suprascapular nerve release by Dr Nové-Josserand, reverse shoulder arthroplasty by Dr Godenèche, combined ACL + ALL reconstruction by Dr Sonnery-Cottet, who will go to Shanghai next year to chair the ISAKOS knee session. The devil is in the detail. I studied every step of their skillful operations and really learned a lot. I felt honoured that I could learn from them, and have them share with me their experience over the past years. I shall have the privilege to continue to do some clinical research with them in the future.
I am really proud of having had part of my training at the Centre Orthopédique Santy. Special thanks go to the academic secretariat, Ms Sophie Plantier, and the SICOT Head Office. With their help, my study days in Lyon were most fruitful and enjoyable. I was happy to make friends with their excellent young fellows, Drs Sautier and Gilles. It was just a pity that Dr Walch was out during that period. I hope I can learn from him in the near future.
Last but not least, I am deeply indebted to the support of my home department, as well as Chairman Prof Huilin Yang, General Secretary of the SICOT China Branch, for his suggestions and guidance, without which this fruitful experience would not have come about.
