Dr Yuri Longatto Boteon and Dr Amanda Pinter Carvalheiro da Silva Boteon have done their Gastrointestinal Surgery Medical Residency at the Department of Surgery, School of Medical Sciences (SMS), University of Campinas (Unicamp). After the specialist training, they revalidated their medical degree in the United Kingdom and applied for Clinical Fellow jobs in Hepatobiliary Surgery (HPB) and Liver Transplant. They both got a job in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham in 2015.

Dra Amanda followed a full clinical pathway and due to her hard working got recognised and reached jobs such as Senior Clinical Fellow and Lead Senior Clinical Fellow. She worked supporting all the surgical trainees of the Liver Unit besides the consultants. Also, she did the tests and became a Certified HPB, Liver Transplant and Multi-Organ Retrieval Surgeon by the UEMS (Union Europeene des Medecins Specilaistes).

Dr Yuri, apart from following the clinical pathway, dedicated part of his time to research. He changed to a Clinical Research job in 2016 and got accepted for a Ph.D degree by the University of Birmingham, College of Medical and Dental Sciences. He was mentored by Dr Simon Afford and the title of his thesis was “Developing normothermic machine liver perfusion for improvement of marginal donor graft quality”. As a result of his thesis, numerous scientific manuscripts were published in high-impact peer review international journals and Yuri received awards from outstanding societies, such as International Liver Transplantation Society and American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.

They returned to Brazil in 2019 and both are currently working at Albert Einstein Hospital, São Paulo. They work as Liver Transplant Surgeons at the unit and with HPB and transplant at the private clinic. Dr Yuri also joined the Albert Einstein Jewish Institute for Education and Research as a full professor in the Post-Graduate Program of Health Sciences.

They both acknowledge that going abroad has expanded not only their life experiences but also their knowledge as specialist doctors. Additionally, they highlighted the importance of medical students and junior doctors whose consider this pathway to prepare themselves and plan this step further ahead. Definitely, they say, this experience is worth although it is necessary strength and determination.