Richards performs surgeries, provides medical education in Ecuador

William Richards, M.D., professor and chair of surgery at the USA College of Medicine, and surgeon Esteban Moscoso, M.D., performed surgeries together in Ecuador. 

William Richards, M.D., recently traveled to Ecuador to perform a resection on a rare tumor, helping a long-time friend gain experience with the procedure. While there, he performed other surgeries and spoke to local medical groups to provide education.

Richards, professor and chair of surgery at the University of South Alabama College of Medicine and director of the USA Surgical Weight Loss Center, has traveled to Ecuador five times since 1995 to give presentations to the Ecuadorian Society of Laparoscopic Surgery as well as students at the medical school there. He has also performed a number of operations during his visits.

Richards visits Ecuador in part because of his long-time friendship with Esteban Moscoso, M.D., a surgeon and a fellow of the American College of Surgeons. The two met in 1992 when Moscoso asked if he could observe Richards perform laparoscopic surgeries. According to Richards, these types of surgeries are as important in Ecuador as in the United States because they help people return to work quicker. The pair have also operated together to give Moscoso experience with various other types of surgery.

Richards’ most recent trip was to help Moscoso operate on a man with an adrenal tumor, which was causing severe hypertension, that could lead to a stroke or heart attack if not removed. Moscoso did not have a great deal of experience resecting this type of tumor, so he reached out to his friend. Richards said adrenal tumors are fairly rare, but the case went well, and the patient no longer has hypertension.

Ironically, the patient was someone that Richards had met during a previous visit to Ecuador 20-years prior. The two share a love of collecting butterflies, and the patient had shared some of his butterfly collection with Richards not knowing that they would meet again under different circumstances.

During his most recent visit, Richards spent eight days in Ecuador,  operated on several additional patients and gave lectures to medical students, surgeons, and residents.

“Besides being a surgeon, I also have the opportunity to help patients indirectly as a medical educator,” Richards said. “While in Ecuador, I helped a friend learn how to do a more advanced cases and provide more surgical options for his patients.

Now, he’s teaching other surgeons how to do these procedures.”