We arrived in London on Saturday afternoon where it was a bit rainy.  We are staying at the Goodenough Club (great name!) which is just around the corner from Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH).

View of Mecklenburgh square from my window

We had a great curry for dinner Saturday night.  On Sunday, we split up to do some exploring - Matt at the Tate Modern (where a mirror hung on the wall allows the person to read their own expression into the artwork), Klane at the British Museum, and I went exploring and shopping.  The weather cleared and we went to the London Eye in the evening.

Here we are getting ready for the 4-D experience (?)

Next some great pictures of the sights! - both from the ground and from the air.

Shakespear's Globe Theater on our stroll down the Thames.

A great group!

We are headed to GOSH this morning for a day of clinics and talks. 

Vienna, Austria

Vienna, Austria.........what a beautiful city!  We arrived here on Wednesday from Aarhus to gorgeous spring weather.  The temperatures have been a "warm" welcome from the colds of Scandanavia.  Professor Franz Frill, of Orthadisches Spital Speising, has been our most gracious host.

As you can see above right, limb reconstruction is a big part of what this group specializes in.  Of course, they also have expertise in many other aspects of pediatric orthopaedics, including cerebral palsy, DDH and skeletal dysplasias.  On day one, we were welcomed into the OR with Dr. Walter Strobl, who specializes in cerbral palsy.  He shared with us his technique of percutaneous myotomy for the treatment of spasticity (here Michelle joins in the fun!):

That night we were treated to a dinner of traditional Viennese food with Professor Grill.  There we ate Wiener Schnitzel.  This is not a hot dog!  It is pretty much veal scallopine, flattened, breaded and fried.  Absolutely delicious!  The next morning it was back to the hospital.  Morning rounds and case review were followed by the limb reconstruction outpatient clinic.  Professor Grill and his colleague, Dr. Rudolf (Rudi) Ganger, see an amazing array of patients with limb deficiencies and post traumatic deformities.  They're tool of choice is the Taylor Spatial Frame.  That afternoon, we were treated to a private tour of Vienna.  Our host, Ulrich (Uli) Hahnkamper was a terrific guide (a little plug for Uli - highly recommended!).

Our tour started outside the Ringstrasse.  This street (strasse) denotes the site of the original medieval wall which made a "ring" around the city.  The wall was torn down in the 1800's, during the reign of Emperor Fraz Joseph, and converted into a beautiful tree-lined boulevard.  The day included a trip to the Belvedere Palace and the home of Sigmund Freud.  Unfortunately, his couch has been moved to London, so we couldn't lay down for a rest!

Joining us for the tour was Professor Tae-Joon Cho.  He was visiting from Seoul National University Children's Hospital.  His presence was an added bonus to the trip, as he is incredibly knowledgable and friendly.Dinner that evening was again fantastic.  This was at the Do & Co Stephansplatz.  The view of Stephansdom (The Cathedral of St. Stephan) was incredible.  The food and drink were equally impressive!

Back to the Hospital the next day, we gave presentations to the hospital staff, which was followed by time in the OR.  We were then treated to a fantastic mini-course in hip ultrasonography by Dr. Renata Pospischill.

      

This was followed by more time in the OR with Prof. Grill and Dr. Posposchill, as they performed an open reduction for a child with DDH.

Of course, after all of this work, we were really hungry!  So we headed back to downtown Vienna and enjoyed some traditional Viennese sausages.  We were joined by Dr. Matthias Pallamar:

Sites for the day included a private tour of the Lipizzan horse stables, very few people get this close to the Lipizzaners.  Our tour guide, Uli, said that he never had had such an opportunity (thanks to Prof. Grill).  We also toured the inner city this time (inside the ringstrasse), which included the home of Amadeus Mozart and an inside view of St. Stephan's Cathedral:

       

What an amazing city!  I think that we all would love to arrange a return visit to this most historic place.  This is the view from the small summer cottage of the Hapsburgs, Park Shonbrunn this morning.  Just breathtaking!

Off to London!

On the road again...

Just like that our time in Aarhus has come and gone and we are on the road again.

We had a great time here in Denmark. Yesterday we got back in to the operating room and assisted on two PAO's performed by Dr. Kjeld Soballe (see below)...he has developed a very nice approach that we all enjoyed learning.

Traveling Fellows and Dr. Soballe

                                                        Michelle getting gowned up!

                   Matt awaiting his gloves...not the attending here so back to being gowned second!

Two sexy Danish surgeons in their tights (shirts) and whites (shoes)!

After a long day in the OR we regrouped back in our host Bjarne Moller-Madsen's office for some late afternoon refreshments...what better choice after the OR then coffee, tequila, or beer...any guesses to who choose what?

Ah Bjarne...quickly becoming a mentor in ALL aspects of our lives. No wonder the Danes are so happy!

Finally a wondeful dinner at a small French resturant with some of the orthopaedic staff from the hospital.

Today we are out early to the airport and make our way to Vienna...more to come from Austria!

Arrival in Aarhus Denmark

Sunday we waved goodbye to Helsinki and flew out over frozen lakes and arrived in Aarhus Denmark yesterday in the early afternoon.  Aarhus is the second largest city in Denmark.

A picture of the airport.

We were met by our gracious host Bjarne Moller-Madsen at the Aarhus airport and our bags were larger than his entire car! Our luggage took a taxi to the hotel and we took a great tour of Mols and the beautiful coastline between the airport and Aarhus - full of beautiful farms and windmills (historic and modern).

Here we are with Bjarne in the lobby of our hotel.  We are staying in a lovely hotel, the Helnan Marselis Hotel, which is situated on the shore with a view of the bay and the ships as they come in. 

This is a picture of the hotel from the website.

Our first day at Aarhus Universtiy Hospital started with danish and coffee for breakfast.

We had a morning of lectures by the PhD students and POSNA fellows.  This was filled with a lively exchange of ideas about research and treatment for the growth plate, OI, SCFE, and MPS.  We also learned Klane's ancestors are from a town not far away (Jens Jensen and family).

Here is Martin Gottliebsen who won the EPOS award for best basic science paper last week.

Juan Manuel Shiguetomi Medina from Mexico is a PhD student studying radiofrequency ablation and the growth plate.

Ole Rahbek smiles for the camera.  We also toured the Skejby Hospital laboratory where surgery is performed in the lab setting with state of the art ORs, imaging (all MRIs are 50% patient time, 50% research time), and lab equipment (MTS, confocal microscopy, histology, microCT).  Tonight is dinner at a local restaurant.  More blogging tomorrow.

Out and about in Helsinki

EPOS concluded Saturday.  This meeting was a wonderful kickstart to our European tour.  We head to Denmark today.  Saturday afternoon was free, so we decided to explore the City of Helsinki.  Helsinki, sitting on the border of western and eastern Europe has a beautiful blend of culture.  From a religious standpoint this means protestant Lutheran and Eastern Orthodox.  Like other European capitals, the cathedrals are amazing.  The Lutheran cathedral, formerly know as the Cathedral of St. Nicolai (now just "the cathedral" out of anti-Russian sentiment) is shown here:

The orthodox cathedral, Upenski Cathedral, is equally impressive:

As you can see, this shot was taken from the open air market.  While we were there, Matt and Michelle did a little bargain hunting:

It's still not clear to me whether or not the Fins consider themselves Scandanavian, but the other booths definitely gave Helsinki a Scandanavian feel:

Meanwhile, I was of course drawn to the food.  The pan fried herring looked and smelled amazing:

Unfortunately, for us, the weather still feels quite Scandanavian, so we passed on the outdoor food experience and made our way through downtown Helsinki.  The city is primarily composed of 5 and 6 story buildings (very 19th century in feel), but rivals any major city in shopping options.  I did not stop in H&M for my daughter however!  Here Matt and Michelle are seen walking in the distance down the main shopping drag.  The street car system, which is quite cool, is also seen:

As you may have noticed, I have a big focus on food.  I love exploring foreign countries via the culinary experience.  This is not good for my attempt to keep the weight off!  Nonetheless, we received a great referral from the front desk receptionist and ended up at an off the beaten path Finnish restaurant (in English - "Seahorse"), where Matt and I dined on the herring that SO caught our eyes:

Many thanks, once again to Dietrich Schlenzka our Helsinki host for a great start to our tour.  We are off to the airport today for Aarhus, Denmark and the company of Bjarne Moller-Madsen!

More EPOS 2012 - Helsinki

Well...down to business today...EPOS 2012 meeting...full day of presentations, meetings, and of course coffee. Don't feel too bad for us, the presentations were great and the company was even better. More time with our hosts, the president of EPOS Prof. Rudiger Krauspe (middle) and our local host Prof. Dietrich Schlenzka (far left).

After that a few beers with the POSNA presidential line and the EPOS Gala Dinner...I wish I could show you those pics but they have a saying here in Helsinki..."what happens in Finland, stays in Finland!"...so that is enough...stay tuned for more

Opening ceremonies of EPOS

one last picture from the clinic in the Children's Hospital of Helsinki.  The whole gang with a demonstration of wood casts - totally biodegradable splint material made from spruce!

Here are Matt and Michelle in the cold, windy, beautiful North.  My first purchase was a THICK wool scarf and some reindeer wool mittens.

Later that night 4/18/2012 we attended the opening ceremonies of the EPOS convention at the city hall.  There we met many great European friends (and heroes).  Here is EPOS president Prof. Rudiger Krauspe who welcomed us! 

 We also enjoyed a performance by local youngpeople in traditional garb with Finnish folkmusic.

After that we went off to a great dinner at a Greek restaurant (in Finland, what?) with a wonderful group - Thanks so much to Deborah Eastwood for dinner!