Ishrs honors janna shafer of smg with 2015 "distinquished assisant award

[Ron Shapiro, MD]

I'm proud to announce that Janna Shafer, my long time Clinical Operations Manager and friend recently received the "Distinguished Surgical Assistant" award at the 2015 ISHRS Conference in Chicago. I am very proud of her. It is the equivialent of the Golden Follicle but for assistants. The award honors surgical assistants with exemplary service and outstanding accomplishments in the field of hair restoration surgery.

Janna started out as a surgical assistant in January of 1996 and quickly moved up to being the Lead Technician and Surgery Manager at Shapiro Medical. Janna has travelled with me to countless countries as well as many cities in the US to participate in live surgery demonstrations and workshops. At these conferences/workshops, Janna was an integral part of the live surgery workshop success, assisting me and also coordinating with foreign clinics to ensure demonstrations ran smoothly. Although at these conferences we are offered the use of other volunteer assistants, It is extremely difficult to demonstrate our unique techniques at other clinics who may not cut grafts or place grafts in the same way we do in our clinic. Janna was instrumental in us being able to demonstrate our technique. She also would help other physicians if they needed assistance.

She usually takes part in the Surgical Assistants Program and workshops at the conferences each year as faculty and speaker. This year (2015) she was in charge and chaired the Surgical Assistants Program in 2015. In the 20 years she's worked with Shapiro Medical, she not only answers questions from patients (often patients of other clinics) but from her peers and other hair transplant physicians. I can't thank Janna enough for her dedication and hard work at SMG and can't think of anyone more deserving of this award.