Born in Beirut to a Lebanese father and a Spanish mother, Dr Dfouni studied medicine at the Autonomous University of Madrid.
Following in the footsteps of her Swiss-German husband, she came to Switzerland to begin her specialisation at Moutier Hospital (1992-1996). Interested in all areas of medicine, she trained for 2 years in surgery, followed by 2 years in internal medicine. Her first revelation was that she had a keen interest in the diagnostic phase and decided to go into radiology.
She arrived in Geneva in 1996 and worked for a year at the HUG. The following year, while working in La Chaux-de-Fonds, she attended a course in Strasbourg given by Professor Jean-Louis Dietemann, a world-renowned expert in the field of neuroradiology. This was her second revelation. She discovered her future speciality, left her job in La Chaux-de-Fonds and moved to Alsace to work in the department of this eminent professor.
There, in 1998, she met Professor Francis Veillon, a leading expert in ENT radiology, a sub-specialty of neuroradiology. This was her third revelation. Dr Dfouni then returned to Geneva, to the HUG, to complete her training in radiology and to subspecialise in ENT radiology in the department of Prof Minerva Becker, where she became Head of Clinic for 6 years.
In 2001, she also moved to Bruges, Belgium, to further her training with Professor Jan Casselman, and then to Barcelona, where she worked in various public and private establishments.
In 2006, she left the HUG for the Clinique La Colline in Geneva, where she worked with a pioneering ENT radiologist, Dr Savo Vukanovic, who was retiring. She became head of ENT Radiology and welcomed Dr Karen Masterson Poyet in 2012.
Gradually, Dr Dfouni, who attaches great importance to meeting and listening to patients, as well as to the quality of the service and ongoing training, felt the need to create a department specialising in neurological and ENT imaging by bringing together radiological and clinical skills in a multidisciplinary project, which did not yet exist in the private sector. She found Professor J.-L. Dietemann, who agreed to join the project, as did Dr Jean-François Guillet.
Having assembled the team, which also included Dr K. Masterson Poyet, Dr. N. Dfouni joined the Radiology Institute at Clinique Générale-Beaulieu on 1 September 2014, which now has three neuroradiologists, including two sub-specialists in ENT.
