Alternate Heegaard genus bounds distance
  Suppose M is a compact orientable irreducible 3-manifold with Heegaard splitting surfaces P and Q. Then either Q is isotopic to a possibly stabilized copy of P or the Hempel distance of the splitting P is no greater than twice the genus of Q.   More generally, if P and Q are bicompressible but weakly incompressible connected closed separating surfaces in M then either a) P and Q can be well-separated or b) P and Q are isotopic or c) the Hempel distance of P is no greater than twice the genus of Q. 
Martin Scharlemann, Maggy Tomova