Dr. Lewandowski will serve aspresident for the 2024–2025 term. He is currently a professor at Northwestern Medicine Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago.
What drew you to IR?
Michael Parra
Robert Lewandowski, MD, FSIR: During my undergraduate education at the University of Michigan, I became interested in orthopedic surgery through research I performed as part of a Mechanical Engineering curriculum. However, being the first person in my family to pursue a career in medicine, I remained open-minded. I was first exposed to interventional radiology during my surgical internship at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, Washington. At that time, interventional radiologists were collaborating with vascular surgeons to develop and perform endovascular treatments for patients with arterial diseases. I was captivated by the elegant, minimally invasive, image-guided alternatives to traditional open surgical treatments. This experience convinced me to evaluate interventional radiology as a career. I quickly became passionate about the vast potential of these procedures. My decision was cemented through my early interactions with the interventional radiology community; I was rivetted by the innovative and collegial nature of those practicing IR.
Tell us about your career. What led to your interest in interventional oncology?
RL: While I began my radiology training at William Beaumont Hospital (Royal Oak, MI) with an interest in peripheral arterial disease, I connected with Riad Salem, MD, MBA, FSIR, who was starting an interventional oncology program. Through research and training, my focus shifted to interventional oncology. Although my early experience with interventional oncology was with transarterial radioembolization, a procedure in which radiation-eluting microspheres are delivered to liver tumors through the hepatic arteries, my focus has evolved into a broader interest in image-guided cancer therapies through the framework of a multidisciplinary care team. That said, I enjoy everything we do as a specialty, such as interacting with patients and physicians across most medical disciplines. IR is an innovative, rapidly changing specialty.
How did you get involved with SIR?
RL: I have been involved with SIR for most of my career, much like the 800+ volunteers currently serving our society, promoting a strong, healthy specialty. I became more invested in SIR volunteerism in 2014 when I was invited to join the Annual Meeting Committee (AMC), a 4-year commitment tasked with developing the structure and agenda of our annual scientific meeting, the premiere event of our society that annually attracts around 5,000 attendees. I was chair of the SIR 2017 Annual Scientific Meeting in Washington, D.C. This experience on the AMC allowed me to collaborate with colleagues across the country, SIR staff, industry partners and other physician volunteers. I was struck by the talent and passion that exists within our specialty and society. When my time on the AMC ended, I sought other volunteer opportunities within SIR, which led me to my current position.
As SIR president, what will be your main priorities for next year?
RL: I think it is important to clarify that being the society’s president isn’t truly a 1-year experience. Rather, it’s a 4-year commitment, starting as secretary. This provides consistency to the ongoing priorities, which are a collaboration between the secretary, presidentelect, president, immediate past president and SIR Executive Director. With a commitment to serving all SIR members, we will be striving to move our specialty forward as an independent medical specialty providing minimally invasive image-guided therapies and comprehensive longitudinal patient care. Currently, my focus is on initiating the search for our next executive director. In this process, we strive to continue our organizational evolution and embrace this as an opportunity to bring in fresh and dynamic perspectives.
What do you think is currently one of the greatest challenges facing IR and how can SIR and SIR Foundation address it?
RL: Despite years of progress, several factors remain that limit many interventional radiologists in their desire to provide comprehensive longitudinal care of their patients. SIR and SIR Foundation can hasten the transition of IR into a clinical specialty focused on the longitudinal care of our patients through several means. These include providing education and resources for SIR members throughout all stages of their careers, facilitating and funding research that delivers the evidence required to support our practices, developing metrics that demonstrate the value of IR to healthcare systems, and advocating for the acceptance and reimbursement of minimally invasive image-guided therapies.
We’re coming up on the 50th anniversary of the SIR. There have been incredibly impactful accomplishments during the last 50 years, such as the primary specialty designation and the IR Residency. What do you think is the next opportunity that the SIR and IR should be striving toward?
RL: The 50th anniversary of SIR is a huge milestone, with many accomplishments to celebrate and many opportunities to explore. To pick just one such opportunity, I believe SIR should strive toward creating subspecialty training to facilitate our members becoming disease-specific multidisciplinary team members and leaders. This message of the natural evolution of our specialty was elegantly delivered through Dr. William Rilling’s Dotter Lecture at the 2023 SIR Annual Scientific Meeting, and it mirrors our new governance structure with domain-specific clinical specialty councils having significant input into our strategic mission.
What are you most excited about as you enter your presidency?
RL: As I enter my presidency, I’m most excited to continue my work with colleagues and friends, pursuing opportunities for the SIR to empower its members to positively impact patients’ lives through image-guided procedures. My vision is that one day, all patients in every corner of the globe will have knowledge of and access to our image-guided therapies.
