. : Can you forward to us the congress “ Mare ”?

:

It is the second congress of the Mediterranean Society of csotcina.comedic surgery which was rested by my friend Jean Manuel . This society was created because with the yarn of the professional meetings: we noted that we were numerous to feel us Mediterranean. The Mediterranean is a large sea which far from being a source of splitting between the people which border it is an element of union. It touches three continents which are Africa, Asia and Europe and gathers all those which live around. Major philosophy and all sciences were born with the hollow from this sea and the majority of the people which are bathed by the Mediterranean has a common history. They are . During many discussions with , we realized that this society could help us to bring us closer to the countries located on the African slope of the Mediterranean. Lino created statutes, he contacted colleagues of all the Mediterranean circumference and all were very glad to take part in the creation of this society. The first congress took place in Marseilles last year. This year, he entrusted the organization of the second congress to me.

 

. : What the csotcina.comedists of the north and the south of the Mediterranean they have in common?

: Much things and that is due to a mixing of the people, very old. Greek civilization then Roman extended on all banks from the Mediterranean basin. Then the Arab conquests went up as far as France. More recently the countries of north colonized those of the south. Today, there exists a migratory flux of North Africa towards Europe, and more particularly towards France and the north of Italy. The majority of people who come from North Africa speak French, which implies a great cultural complicity. I speak French badly but I understand myself very well with the Mediterranean ones because they have a receptiveness of mind and a heat of core favourable with the friendship. In short, in a certain manner, one can say that they are “Latin” as opposed to the “Anglo-Saxon” character.

 

. : Don't you think that the great differences as regards hospital equipment, make the dialog difficult?

: Not, much of departmental managers of csotcina.comedy of the countries of North Africa are high level surgeons who were formed in Italy but especially in France. They
modern technologies then they learned re-entered on their premises to try to advance the things. This congress gives them, I think, the possibility of joining again links always present and of swapping the experiments. Each one is conscious of the material gap which separates it from its fellow-member but the surgical crop is the same one and there are truly appropriatenesses of development and mutual enrichment.

 

. : Why this congress have-you he place in Syracuse?

: It is true that I am instructor of csotcina.comedy in Rome and that it would have been natural to organize the congress there. The city is connected to the Mediterranean by the Tiber but it is not on the sea. The Steering committee frankly wished a city on the sea and as I was born beside Syracuse, this choice naturally asserted myself. Syracuse was one of the first Greek colonies and from its strategic position she played a very important part in the history of the Mediterranean. My friend, the archeologist wrote: “There exist exceptional places in the world where natural, myth and history, seem to have given the best; Syracuse is one of those there”. Lastly, Syracuse was the fatherland of a large scientist of humanity: Archimedes. It is a very rich city of antiquities and vestiges. My work place being Rome, the organization of the congress posed some problems to me, but that was worth the sorrow of it. After the working sessions one will visit the old city and the knowledge of art and the old crop will enable us to grow rich.

 

. : Summers you sicilian?

: Yes, my family is of , beside Syracuse. I studied at the University of in Sicily. In the Sixties, this medical college had good reputation very. After six years of formation, after the doctorate, I wanted to see another thing elsewhere, then I left to Rome to the university private clinic surgery of where they had started to make the first kidney transplants into 69. But this surgery was not made for me. I wished to specialize me in a field more targeted. One then spoke to me about the Instructor Boni who had the pulpit of csotcina.comedy in Pavia, in the north of Italy. He was considered, for his scientific rigor and his passion for the true crop, one of the best instructors of his time. I went to see it and it received me very cordially. The first morning when I went at his place, it took me along to the to see an intervention on the cervical rachis by former channel. For me which had seen in the south of Italy only csotcina.comedic processing which stopped with the plaster, it was extraordinary, and I remained at his place 18 years.

 

. : It is as simple as that in Italy, you disembark in a service in Pavia and one takes to you as raises?

: But not it is not so easy! Only when initiatives are taken and that one decides to build his future, the opportunities arise. Profit did not have a child and it was devoted entirely to csotcina.comedy. It took to me as raises and me I loved much this Master who forwarded his surgical passion so well to us.

 

. : As this period near him occurred?

: I directed myself immediately towards the vertebral surgery. Many things were done but one worked especially on the cervical rachis. I sought in the csotcina.comedic literature the authors who were interested in the rachis. For example in 72, I learned that in Toronto there was a Mr who was called Jean Mac who made surgery of the narrow vertebral canal and arthrodeses inter-transversals. I went thus to see it and remained three months at his place. It practiced already the of the intervertebral discs and it learned to me much. But the great revelation of my life was the Parisian instructor, Raymond , who made wonders, more especially as we know only the stems of like osteosynthesis.

 

. : But how did you hear of Mr. ?

: At the end of the Seventies, it had organized an exchange rate, the “First Days of Pity”. I had sent my card of inscription and I had asked to remain some time in his service. had given me its agreement. The history of our meeting is very amusing. I had a friend who was secretary with the embassy of Italy and I had asked him to find me a point of fall in Paris. It had found me an apartment avenue of . I rolled in Alpha Romeo and the parking area nearest was with the Hilton hotel. The first morning to go to the hospital, I returned in the hall of Hilton to take the elevator which led to the garage. A Mr in impermeable very elegant white, quite shaven, and content joined me. We swap courtesies and we go down to the parking area. Our cars were parked one opposite the other. ” ! an Italian car “me have-you it tells, and it from goes away. I arrived at Pitié Salpêtrière, I went on the 7th floor where the secretariat of Prof was. Its secretary, a rather hard lady, told me: ” The owner arrives, sit you there “. I waited half an hour, then she finally said me to enter. I entered the office and I fell on the Mr from the parking area. What a pleasant surprise!

 

. : How was held your passage at ?

: Very, very well and I remained one year whole there. had the capacity to put people at ease and in confidence. He advised me to take guards in order to better familiarize me with his technique. He told me: “, if you are able to put screws in the pedicles and to use the rachidian plates it is that my technique is at the point”. He learned to me enormously from things on the rachis and the life. He suggested me making my thesis of foreign assistant on the tumors of the rachis. Gradually, a friendship was created between us who was well beyond a relation of Master to pupil. In 1980, it organized holidays in Martinique with his close friends and it made me the honor be invited. During cruising, we spoke about theology, of philosophy, sometimes of policy but never of screw or pedicle, one had left all that to the hospital. was a large Master and a large friend. He learned to me much and given in the field of the formation. He always told: “Looks at this approach is logical. The gesture of a surgeon must be simple, direct, logical”.

 

. : Then, you go back to Pavia…

: Raymond had given me plates and screws and when I returned, a patient forwarded the symptoms of metastatic lesions . My Owner trusted me and I thus posed the first rachidian plate of Italy in 1979. Thereafter, this hardware was marketed in Italy. I used it regularly but I must tell with a certain reprobation of my colleagues. In a congress on the vertebral fractures, a large Italian instructor forwarded like first slide a launch vehicle of knife in a circus with some knives planted to the good place, but much anywhere. At all events, I was in a service where I did much spine surgery, but where it was also necessary to do many of other things. I directed during 7 years the department of surgery of pediatric csotcina.comedics, and then of the adult. I thus made hip prosthese, knee prostheses and a little all general csotcina.comedy. I wanted to make a teaching hospital career but in 1986, my Master Profit died, then I was in the need for finding another place. The Instructor made it possible to me to return in , to Sicily, where it received me in his service as associate professor. I remained at his place of 86 until 94. It was very pleasant because I was at home, in my house, with my wife and my children: we were happy. I had my boat with the gate of the house.

 

. : Were the work conditions of very different from those of Pavia?

: Enough. One day, my friend Jean passed to , and he asked me what I had with the operational program. I told him a former access of the cervical rachis and it wished to assist me. Of course I accepted, and I organized this intervention in my surgical unit. The morning, we arrived at the hospital, and while we climb, we crossed the patient who was in pyjamas, his pillow and his clinical records under the arm. He told me: “ Mr you arrived, I am ready for the intervention”. Jean remained about it stops . The intervention promptly proceeded. In this way, we had only very seldom infections. But if people of the south are more alive, more semi-sparkling, they are less inclined with the organization. In I was to occupy me of all, to find the appropriations and the posts for my assistants. I spent 70% of my time for administrative work. And it was necessary to negotiate for all!

 

. : And then?

: A new University, the Campus, was created in Rome. It is the 4th University of Rome. Why one 4th? Because people wanted to place the patients in the middle of the hospital organization. All must turn around the patients and one must try to look after human people and not only diseases. The same approach is considered for the students who must be in the center of the operative paragraph of teaching. The student, as at the primary school, arrives at 9:00 of the morning and share to 15:00 the instructors is also tutors who commit themselves following the students during all their university course. Friends asked me to be torn off with my “” Sicilian and to make an effort to try to launch this university. Then I came to Rome. I passed an internal competition as an associate professor. In 94, was still alive, and he told proudly: “I placed Gerard and Thierry in Paris, I placed Yves at Fort-de-France and I placed at Rome”. Since 94, the university increased. Currently, we have almost all the important specialities of the surgery. We are building medical faculty and of the departments of search.

 

. : Summers you specialized in the rachis?

: Yes, but I have a pulpit of csotcina.comedy and I must thus teach all the pathology of the foot to the hand. I have assistants who make hand surgery, shoulder, hip, knee and foot. At the beginning, I was obliged to make of all, today I can say that I made a choice: cervical rachis.

 

. : Into did 20 years, the spinal surgery change much?

: Not much. Many csotcina.comedists gave up this rather heavy surgery what started again the neurosurgeons. Unfortunately, all do not have a good training in bone surgery what poses problems of stabilization of the rachis. But, it is a field which is becoming to the hands neurosurgeons.

 

. : Do you also have in Italy of the problems of insurances?

: Of course, but we are soliciting the government so that it promulgates some laws to protect the doctors because the surgery soon will become impracticable. It is known that there are failures and complications but it is also necessary to take account of the context and the risk factors. The large majority of the applications for repayment are not justified.

 

. : How is csotcina.comedy in Italy organized?

: We have nonuniversity university hospitals, hospitals and very many accredited private clinics, i.e. one can there be made look after as with the public hospital. These structures start to become increasingly important and are not overdrawn because they are managed like firms. With the Campus, there is an innovation. Recently, I have appointment once a month with the administrative Director, to examine for example, the relevance of settlements. If I make a biopsy of the vertebral body I gain more than if I make a vertebral prosthesis. It is surprising! For example for the surgery of the scolioses of the adult the hospital touches 4000 E per patient, but I spend 8.000 E for the hardware. Then to be able to make this surgery, on my 21 interventions of the week, I must make 18 of them where I am profit to be able to make 3 of them where I am overdrawn.

 

. : Do the private patients go only in private clinic?

: Not, currently with the new regulation we have the possibility of having consultations deprived in hospital, as you for a long time did in France. Simply the hospitals are not well organized to have private beds. In what relates to me, I am full-time at the hospital but as the aforementioned does not have the possibility of placing at my disposal the rooms for my private activity, I have a contract with a private clinic where I am authorized to operate. The hospital makes deductions on these private incomes and then my due transfers me.

 

. : There-have-you he a “Latin” manner to practice csotcina.comedy?

: In any case there is Italian but such a French manner to operate. My experiment of the Anglo-Saxon surgical medium revealed a certain rigidity of the technical procedures with repetitive sequences. I think that facilitates the transmission of the basic knowledge to the young people. But that withdraws the personal side of the surgical practice and this “Latin” capacity very to adapt to the unforeseen situations. What my Masters Mario Profit and Raymond forwarded to me it is above all, a certain logic of the operational gesture.