Christopher J. Dobzyniak, MD, Interventional Radiologist at Medical Center Radiologists, discusses his clinical interests, approach to patient care, and what's new and developing in the field of Interventional Radiology.
everybody. I'm dr christa brainiac. I'm the chief of interventional radiology with medical center radiologists and the medical director for interventional radiology. Its internal for general Hospital. So as an interventional radiologist, we get to be involved in a lot of things. Um and really that was one of the big interest for me, for both coming here and becoming interventional radiologists in the first place. Um We get to be involved with the full spectrum of care. And for me, uh it was it was the oncology aspect of it was really important. So we get to be involved from the very beginning of the patient's care, from their diagnosis, from tissue procurement from biopsies to then offering therapies whether it's uh chemo embolization of a liver cancer or radio embolization of a liver cancer, ablation of a of a renal tumor. Uh Ultimately, we get to follow those patients off and out when therapies are no longer options and we get to be involved in the palliative components of it, where we're really offering them things that are making them more comfortable in improving their quality of life at the end and being able to be involved in that full spectrum, from a clinical standpoint is really what's been important for me. I think one of the things that's really drawn me to this area into this field into this practice was that we really focus on it being a clinical interventional radiology practice, which is a bit unique across the country and within the area. And sort of, our philosophy on that is that we're gonna be very involved in the patient's care. We're going to be one of their doctors, one of the members of their health care team, that's really going to allow them to improve their quality of life, get the best delivery of care and be available to them. So part of my philosophy about all of this is I'm one of their doctors. I'm going to be involved in their care and I'm gonna be available when they need me. So one of the things that brought me here when I came out of my fellowship almost 11 years ago now was just a quality and breath of the practice. Um and the opportunities that we had, I knew I wanted to be in an environment where I could continue to be in a teaching situation, residents and teaching residents and medical students and fellows keeps you fresh, keeps you on your toes and keeps you very engaged in the latest and greatest things. I also wanted to be at a big hospital. I wanted to be at a flagship institution and that option became available to me to be at Norfolk General Hospital, where coronary Care Center were a level one trauma center, uh the other specialists in the hospital, the other practice in the hospital. Really the best of the best. And we're able to offer the full spectrum of very high quality care. Um We're we're not having to send patients out to other institutions to get it. We can do it here. Okay. I think some of the things that are really interesting in our field now is the growth in the ability to deliver on oncological services. Um And some of these things are have been around for a while but we're really getting to the point where we can tailor them very well to the patient where we can really deliver them uh in a complex fashion. And really where we're going with oncological services is the ability to integrate different therapies. Uh Individual patient may get a chemo embolization, they may get a radio mobilisation and then down the road we may have to do something else. We may have to add in something like a microwave ablation or cryo ablation. Um So really I think it's the integration of care, the refinement of how we're delivering these things, how we're choosing them, how were integrated into their oncological care as a whole. And we're really becoming another pillar along with radiation oncology, Medical oncology and surgical oncology now exists interventional oncology. So we're really allowed ourselves to become a player at the table and we've seen that really is we've developed tumor boards that have allowed us to really deliver much better care to patients.
