Michael W. Groff, M.D. is the Immediate Past Chair of the Disorders of Spine and Peripheral Nerves section, having served as chair in 2013- 2014. He the Director of Spinal Neurosurgery at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and earned his MD at the University of Pittsburgh. He

then went on to the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York for internship and residency training in Neurological Surgery. He completed his training at the Medical College of Wisconsin with a fellowship in Spinal Surgery.

Dr. Groff is active in the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS), NeuroPoint Alliance (NPA), and the Neurosurgical Research and Education Fund (NREF). His academic interests include process improvement, health services research, outcome measures, and guideline development. He was interviewed for the newsletter in February 2015.

John Ratliff: What was your favorite part about being chair of the Spine Section?

Michael Groff: I think it’s a very dynamic group of people who are completely committed to improving the quality of operative spine care. It was a very rewarding experience.

John Ratliff: Did you have any significant difficulties during your year as president?

Michael Groff: I think that some of the big challenges revolved around trying to document and ascertain the evidence for the treat- ments that we offer.

Another big challenge was trying to create an environment that would foster a greater collaboration between orthopedic and neurosurgical spine surgeons. I think that it really is one of the most important things to help move the field forward. The vast majority of members in both communities are very committed to it, and yet at the same time, they are institutional and bureaucratic obstacles.

John Ratliff: Do you think the primary challenge is a personal one between surgeons that are still competing for patients or is it more institutional between different departments?

Michael Groff: As you know, all politics are local, but I think, in general, the collaboration in their trenches is very strong. I believe there is a great degree of mutual respect and a recogni- tion of a common mission. There are challenges on the national level, not that people don’t want it to happen, it’s just that we are beholden to different communities.

John Ratliff: What advice would you give someone who wants to become more involved in this section?

Michael Groff: I think the Spine Section’s strongest element is the participation in its membership and that it really is a very much a meritocracy. My advice would be to get plugged in at whatever level possible and start contributing. In my own experience the first thing that I did was just manning sawbones stations at national meetings. One thing leads to another, for doing good work you get recognized, and if you do a good job you are rewarded with bigger and bigger jobs to do.

One of things that is very unique about the Spine section, in contrast to other societies, is that the Spine section really has a strong culture of promoting the young members within its group. Young people that are interested can take over positions of leadership much earlier than they would in other organizations.