After graduation, I was directed to a great place – Abastumani, a place with an observatory and the cleanest air. It was a place where patients with pulmonary tuberculosis were receiving treatment. After 2 years working there, my sphere of interest became pulmonary medicine. In 1987, I started my first job as a pulmonologist in diagnostic department of Research Institute of Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases in Tbilisi. There I’ve been interested in novel diagnostic method, called bronchoscopy. Milestone in my career was case of middle aged female patient. She suffered with haemoptysis, chest pain, weight loss. Radiologically she was diagnosed with lung cancer. During the diagnostic bronchoscopy I discovered a plastic denture in the bronchial lumen and removed it. I never forget her happy eyes. I realized the power of bronchoscopy and decided to perfect this method. In 1990, I went to Central Research Institute of Tuberculosis RAMS (CTRI) in Moscow to study this method. Fiberbronchoscopy was not enough for me and in 1991 I went to the Roentgen-Radiology Research Institute in Moscow to study rigid bronchoscopy and transthoracic needle biopsy (TNB). At that time bronchoscopy and TBN were highly modern diagnostic methods. Since 2011 I am a member of European Association for Bronchology and Interventional Pulmnology (EABIP). I was the first in Georgia to implement airway stenting, laser resection, valvular bronchoblocation. Successful cases are growing rapidly during the recent years.
