Reflections on the 21st ESCRS Winter Meeting from Dr Leigh Spielberg

“Well, it depends on what you’re looking for, and what you want to learn,” was my answer to a recent question from a young ophthalmologist. She was trying to determine whether she would attend the ESCRS Winter Meeting. “I’m primarily interested in cataract surgery,” she said. I answered that that’s a pretty broad topic. Was she interested in an update on the comparison of FLACS to conventional cataract surgery and other recent clinical insights? If so, I suggested she attend the Free Paper Session: Cataract on Saturday at 8.30am. Or was she more concerned with obtaining perfect refractive outcomes after cataract surgery? “Absolutely. Patients these days are so well informed,” she agreed. “Lots of patients in my training hospital know all about refractive outcomes after phacos, so even if my surgeries go well, I’m concerned about being able to offer my patients a chance to be spectacle-free.” I told her she should definitely attend the Cataract Surgery Didactic Course: Part 2, on Saturday at 8.00am. A whole presentation will be devoted to intraoperative correction of astigmatism, including toric lenses and both laser and knife incisions. “That sounds good, but what I really want to hear is how I can fix the inevitable mistakes I’ll make early on in my learning curve,” she said. She, like all young surgeons, is a bit nervous about her skills. I recommended the symposium The Usual Suspects: How to Handle Your First Complications on Sunday at 9am. But this wasn’t enough. She wants to be able to offer postoperative touch-ups to eliminate even the slightest refractive errors. “How about the Refractive Surgery Didactic Course?” I asked. Part 2 of the course starts on Saturday at 8.00am. She wasn’t satisfied. Didn’t I know that refractive surgery itself could have complications?! “The organisers didn’t forget that. Check out the symposium on Long-term Complications of Refractive Surgery,” I said. This takes place on Saturday at 11.30am. “I don’t know,” she said. “I’m really a visual learner. I need to see some action. I feel like I retain most information by watching others operate.” Aha! I recommended the Live/Near Live Surgery session, which will feature everything from FLACS with a PanOptix toric IOL and intraoperative aberrometry, to cataract surgery with CALLISTO eye and implantation of an EDOF toric IOL (Saturday at 2pm, transmitted from the Maastricht University Medical Center).   She was now interested in going, but found it questionable that a whole conference be dedicated to nothing but cataract and refractive surgery. Even if it was the European Society of Cataract & Refractive Surgeons that was hosting it! “Of course not. Saturday includes a Cornea Didactic Course, featuring clinical cornea in the morning (starting at 8.00am) and surgical cornea (starting at 11.45am). It’ll cover everything from basic science to lab testing for ocular surface diseases to an update on endothelial transplantation and amniotic membranes. If you still have energy left over, Saturday also features a whole symposium on Minimally Invasive Glaucoma Surgery (MIGS) for Cataract Surgeons, which starts at 4.30pm. It includes a systematic review of MIGS outcomes and discussions of various approaches. You really can’t go wrong.” I think I had made my point. “See you there!” she said.   Dr Leigh Spielberg is a vitreoretinal and cataract surgeon 
at Ghent University Hospital in Belgium