A panel of experts will discuss the evolving science and best practices for treating motility disorders on Sunday during the annual Josephine and Michael Camilleri, MD, Lecture — Motility Matters 2017: An Interactive Forum to Debate What Progress the Field Has Made in the Treatment of GI Motility Disorders.
“Motility runs the entire spectrum from very common disorders that are highly treatable to very complex diseases where we have very little to offer in the way of intervention,” said John E. Pandolfino, MD, AGAF, the Hans Popper professor of medicine and chief of gastroenterology and hepatology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago. “A large number of problems we see in the outpatient clinic are related to abnormal motility and dysfunction of the brain-gut interface.”
Dr. Pandolfino will co-moderate the AGA Clinical Symposium with Satish S.C. Rao, MD, PhD, AGAF, professor of medicine and director of the Digestive Health Center at Augusta University, GA, and Nicholas J. Talley, MD, PhD, AGAF, professor of medicine and epidemiology at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN.
“We’re taking a novel approach to the Camilleri Lecture this year,” Dr. Rao said. “It’s really not a lecture at all — it’s a question-and-answer forum and debate. We will be asking hot-topic, debatable questions focusing on tests and treatment and what progress has been made recently.”
The session will be divided into three topic areas — esophagus, stomach, and small intestine and colorectal. The moderators for each segment will pose tough motility questions to the panelists, who will discuss and debate management and treatment issues. The audience will be encouraged to participate at microphones throughout the room.
Dr. Pandolfino said attendees can expect to hear detailed discussion about achalasia, constipation, gastroparesis, small intestine bacterial overgrowth and other disorders, and talk of new technologies that have quietly moved from academic centers into the community. On the pharmacologic side, clinicians have a range of new drugs for constipation, including opioid antagonists for patients with opioid-induced constipation.
“If you are a general GI doc, you’re going to be seeing a lot of people with motility problems, which can have significant morbidity and devastating effects on life expectancy and quality of life,” Dr. Pandolfino said. “Understanding the fundamentals, understanding the pitfalls and dealing with the complications are important parts of daily practice and taking care of these patients appropriately.”
Please refer to the DDW Mobile App or the Program section in Sunday’s DDW Daily News for additional details on this and other DDW® events.
Donor Corner
Josephine and Michael Camilleri, MD, AGAF
Why is the clinical symposium important?
Dr. Camilleri: This symposium is appropriately titled Motility Matters. The topics for this important interactive discussion among world experts include some of the most common disorders encountered in clinical gastroenterology practice.
What does it mean for you to support the AGA Research Foundation through a clinical symposium?
Dr. Camilleri: Our support is intended to give back to the AGA and to our specialty in appreciation of all the benefits in education, practice and research that I received over the past 33 years as an attendee of AGA meetings and as a beneficiary of the AGA/SmithKline Beecham Clinical Research Award in 1988. It’s also an expression of gratitude for the opportunity to serve the AGA and the specialty of gastroenterology in many different ways.
AGA is grateful to its donors for their generous contributions, which go directly to the AGA Research Foundation awards program endowment to support future research that will lead to improved patient care.
