Department of Otolaryngology - Service Chief Reports

Gady Har-El, MD, Director

The Division of Head and Neck Surgery and Oncology continues to be extremely active and productive, both clinically and academically. Drs. Har-El, Sundaram, and Lim, continue their role in running the leading center for head and neck cancer management in Brooklyn. Patients are being referred from Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. In addition, our voluntary attending staff, especially Drs. Dodaro, S. Kantu, M. Kantu, Carney and Finn continue to bring their head and neck surgical cases to our institutions, benefiting from the support of the department and residents, and enriching our teaching patient volume.

The Division of Head and Neck Surgery and Oncology at Long Island College Hospital runs two busy head and neck tumor boards every month. In addition, we have a monthly multi-disciplinary head and neck cancer tumor board at SUNY-Downstate/Kings County Hospital. There is full participation of our attending and resident staff members in all tumor board conferences. Other participants include radiation oncologists, medical oncologists, radiologists, and pathologists. These dedicated tumor board sessions have been very successful in discussing difficult cases and designing treatment plans. In addition, a representative from our division participates in the Long Island College Hospital weekly, hospital-wide, general tumor board and leads the discussion on head and neck cancer patients.

In addition, we also benefit from Dr. Boris Bentsianov's experience and expertise in rehabilitation of head and neck cancer patients after ablative surgery. This includes management and rehabilitation of their speech and swallowing functions.

Physicians in the Division of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery have been working closely with our cancer surgeons on advanced reconstructive procedures for head and neck cancer. Dr. Afshin Parhiscar has been working with us for the last six years at both Long Island College Hospital and Kings County Hospital. His experience and expertise in reconstructive surgery in general and in microvascular free tissue transfer in particular, has helped our patients tremendously. In fact, his success rate in free tissue transfer has been very impressive. Dr. Richard Westreich is the Director of the Division within the Department of Otolaryngology. His experience and expertise in management of facial skin cancer is an important part of our teaching program.

Faculty members and residents of our department are regular participants and attendees at the meetings of the New York Head and Neck Society, which is the largest local/regional head and neck oncological organization in North America. In 2004, Dr. Har-El served as the President of this society.

We had also important technological additions in our operating rooms at Long Island College Hospital, SUNY-Downstate, and Kings County Hospital. First, state-of-the-art sophisticated intraoperative computerized navigation systems is available at the operating rooms in all 3 institutions. This equipment has a significant positive impact on our ability to manage skull base lesions with added patient safety. Second, we have the availability of intraoperative parathyroid hormone essay at Long Island College Hospital. This changes significantly the management of patients with primary hyperparathyroidism. Surgery is significantly shorter and post-operative hospital stay will be reduced.

On the academic level, our residents presented papers at the Eastern Section Meeting of the American Laryngological, Otological and Rhinological Society, as well as the American Head and Neck Society.