Feature
Opportunities and challenges in pediatrics
An interview with Richard B. Towbin, MD, FSIR, and James S. Donaldson, MD
“The only constant in life is change.” —HERACLITUS By Lisa Kang, MD
The field of pediatric interventional radiology has evolved and expanded immensely over just a few decades and continues to do so at an ever-increasing pace. Richard B. Towbin, MD, FSIR, a 2021 SIR Gold Medalist and former director of pediatric radiology at Phoenix Children’s Hospital, and James S. Donaldson, MD, professor of radiology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, have observed and been key participants in this evolution.
In this interview, Drs. Towbin and Donaldson spoke with IRQ on how pediatric IR has come into its own as a subspecialty, the role of pediatric IRs in multidisciplinary care and how to approach training the next generation.
22 IRQ | SUMMER 2021
Lisa Kang, MD: You were both involved in the early days of pediatric IR. How has the field evolved? Richard B. Towbin, MD, FSIR: I started in pediatric radiology in the 1970s after finishing my training as a pediatrician. On the adult patient side, interventional radiology was already taking hold, but not in pediatrics. We began trying to improve on the interventional procedures the adult side was pioneering and were focused on designing equipment specifically for younger patients. There was nothing designed that would work in children at the time, so we were innovating with sedation and catheters. We had some new inventions, but
mostly we adapted existing tools, watched the adult IRs and tried to do the procedures in kids. The first therapies we did were aspiration, drainage and biopsies. Everything morphed when good CT and MR came out, because the imaging was fast and we were then able to guide procedures using imaging. Once we could better
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