SURGERY ROUND

Medical students are often attached to the various services. They can provide a significant contribution to patient care. However, their work requires supervision by the surgical intern/resident who takes primary clinical responsibility. Subinterns are senior medical students who are seeking additional clinical experience. Their assistance is needed and appreciated, but again, close supervision of their clinical responsibilities by the intern/resident is  mandatory.Outside reading is recommended, including textbooks, reference sources, and monthly journals.Eating is prohibited in patient care areas.Maintain patient confidentiality at all times.At conferences use only patient initials in presentations; and speak carefully and respectfully on  work rounds.

PRINCIPLES

1. Always be punctual (this includes ward rounds, operating room, clinics, conferences, morbidity and mortality). Personal appearance is very important. Maintain a high standard including clean shirt and tie (or equivalent) and a clean white coat. The day begins early. Be ready with all the data to start rounds with the senior resident or chief resident. Be sure to provide enough time each morning to examine your patients before rounds.

ABOUT NOTES

2.Aim to get all of your chart notes written as soon as possible; this will greatly increase your effi ciency during the day. Sign and print your name, and include your beeper number, date, and time. Progress notes on patients are required daily. Surgical progress notes should be succinct and accurate, briefl y summarizing the patient’s clinical status and plan of management. Someone unfamiliar with the case should be able to get a good understanding of the patient’s condition from one or two notes. Operative consent is obtained after admitting the patient, performing the history and physical examination, discussing the risks, benefi ts, and alternatives of the procedure(s), and having the patient’s nurse sign the consent with the patient. If you are unaware of the risks and benefi ts of a procedure, discuss this with the service chief resident. Blood transfusion attestation forms need to be signed by the counseling physician before each surgical procedure.

OPERATING ROOM

3. Arrive in the operating room with the patient and before the attending physician or chief resident. Make sure that the charts and all of the relevant x-rays are in the operating room. Make sure that the x-rays are on the x-ray view box prior to the commencement of the case. The intern or resident performing the case should be familiar with the patient’s history and physical exam, current medications, and comorbidities, and be familiar with the principles of the operation prior to arriving in the operating room. Make it a habit to introduce yourself to the patient before the operation. It is mandatory that the surgical resident involved with a case in the operating room attend the start of the case punctually. Scheduled operative cases do not necessarily occur at the listed time. For this reason, it is necessary to check with the operating room front desk frequently. Do not rely on being paged. Conduct in the operating room includes assisting with the preoperative positioning and preparation of the patient; this includes shaving, catheterization, protection of pressure points, and thromboembolism protection. The resident should escort the patient from the operating room to the intensive care unit (ICU) or the postanesthetic care unit with the anesthesiologists. The operating surgeon is responsible for dictating the case. The resident must record all cases performed. For cases admitted to the surgery ICU, a hand-over to the surgery ICU resident is mandatory.This includes discussing all the preoperative assessment, operative details, and postoperative management of the case with the ICU resident.

ROUNDS

4. Signing out to cross-cover services must be performed in a meticulous and careful fashion. All patients should be discussed between the surgical intern and the cross-covering intern to cover all potential problems. A sign-out list containing all the patients, patient locations, and the responsible attendings should be given personally to the cross-cover intern. Any investigations performed at night (e.g., lab studies, chest x-ray, electrocardiogram [ECG]) should be checked that night by the covering intern. No test order should go unchecked. Abnormal lab values should be reviewed and discussed with the senior resident or the attending staff, especially on preoperative patients. Starting antibiotics should be a decision left to the senior resident or attending staff. If consultants are asked to see patients, their recommendations mustbe discussed with your senior resident or attending priorto initiating any new plans. Independent thought is good; independent action is bad.

SUPERVISION

5. Document all procedures performed on patients—including arterial lines, chest tubes, and central lines—with a short procedure note in the chart. Every patient contact should be documented in the patient record.If you see a patient in the middle of the night, write a short note to describe your assessment and plan. Remember, if there is no documentation, then nobody responded to the patient’s complaint or needs. Obtain appropriate supervision for procedures. There are always more senior residents available if your chief is not. Protect yourself; practice universal precautions! Wash your hands before and after examining a patient. Wear gloves. All wounds should be inspected every day by the surgical intern as part of the clinical examination. Please re-dress them; the nursing staff is not always immediately available to do so. There should never be any surprises in the morning.

RESIDENTS

Your senior resident is responsible for the service and should be kept aware of any problems, regardless of the time of day. If the senior resident is not available, the attending staff should be contacted directly. There are always senior residents in the hospital who are available to be used as resources for emergencies. Always be aware of who is in-house (i.e., consult resident, ICU resident, trauma chief). A surgery resident’s days are long. They start early and they fi nish late.  Always remember the three A’s to being a successful resident: Affable, Available, and Able. Be prepared to maintain a flexible daily schedule depending on the workload of the service and the requirement for additional manpower.

EXCELÊNCIA

 Nunca baixar os seus padrões pessoais e profissionais. Fazer sempre o melhor, NÃO SOMENTE O POSSÍVEL.

INTEGRIDADE

 Fazer sempre a coisa certa, mesmo quando ninguém está olhando.

RESPONSABILIDADE

 Cumprir rigorosamente as atribuições em relação aos cuidados com os pacientes do serviço.

ATITUDE

Ser uma força positiva com comprometimento na melhor assistência ao paciente.

DISCIPLINA

 É a construção diária do seu objetivo.

PERSEVERANÇA

 O sucesso vem um pequeno passo de cada vez. O amanhã começa agora.

1.Getting along with the nurses.

The nurses do know more than the rest of us about the codes, routines, and rituals of making the wards run smoothly. They may not know as much about pheochromocytomas and intermediate filaments, but about the stuff that matters, they know a lot. Acknowledge that, and they will take you under their wings and teach you a ton!

2. Helping out.

If your residents look busy, they probably are. So, if you ask how you can help and they are too busy even to answer, asking again probably would not yield much. Always leap at the opportunity to shag x-rays, track down lab results, and retrieve a bag of blood from the bank. The team will recognize your enthusiasm and reward your contributions.

3. Getting scutted.

We all would like a secretary, but one is not going to be provided on this rotation. Your residents do a lot of their own scut work without you even knowing about it. So if you feel like scut work is beneath you, perhaps you should think about another profession.

4. Working hard.

This rotation is an apprenticeship. If you work hard, you will get a realistic idea of what it means to be a resident (and even a practicing doctor) in this specialty. (This has big advantages when you are selecting a type of internship. Staying in the loop. In the beginning, you may feel like you are not a real part of the team. If you are persistent and reliable, however, soon your residents will trust you with more important jobs. Educating yourself, and then educating your patients. Here is one of the rewarding places (as indicated in question 1) where you can soar to the top of the team. Talk to your patients about everything (including their disease and therapy), and they will love you for it.

5. Maintaining a positive attitude.

As a medical student, you may feel that you are not a crucial part of the team. Even if you are incredibly smart, you are unlikely to be making the crucial management decisions. So what does that leave: attitude. If you are enthusiastic and interested, your residents will enjoy having you around, and they will work to keep you involved and satisfied. A dazzlingly intelligent but morose complainer is better suited for a rotation in the morgue. Remember, your resident is likely following 15 sick patients, gets paid less than $2 an hour, and hasn’t slept more than 5 hours in the last 3 days. Simple things such as smiling and saying thank you (when someone teaches you) go an incredibly long way and are rewarded on all clinical rotations with experience and good grades.

Having fun! This is the most exciting, gratifying, rewarding, and fun profession and is light years better than whatever is second best (this is not just our opinion).

By: Alden H. Harken MDProfessor and Chair, Department of Surgery, University of California, San Francisco–East Bay, Oakland, California, Chief of Surgery, Department of Surgery, Alameda County Medical Center, Oakland, California

Nosso medo mais profundo não é o de sermos inadequados. Nosso medo mais profundo é que somos poderosos além de qualquer medida. É a nossa luz, não nossa escuridão, que mais nos assusta. Nós nos perguntamos: Quem sou eu para ser brilhante, maravilhoso, talentoso e fabuloso? Na verdade, quem não quer que você seja? Você é um filho de Deus. Seu papel pequeno não serve ao mundo. Não há nada de iluminado em se encolher, para que outras pessoas não se sintam inseguros ao seu redor. Estamos todos feitos para brilhar, como as crianças. Nascemos para manifestar a glória de Deus que está dentro de nós. Não é apenas em alguns de nós, está em todos. E conforme deixamos nossa própria luz brilhar, inconscientemente damos às outras pessoas permissão para fazer o mesmo. Como estamos libertamos do nosso medo, nossa presença, automaticamente, libera os outros.

Esse texto é atribuído a Marianne Williamson, uma autora e palestrante americana. A passagem faz parte de seu livro “A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles” (1992). Williamson explora temas de autoaceitação, potencial humano e espiritualidade, incentivando as pessoas a reconhecerem e expressarem sua luz interior. A citação destaca a ideia de que o verdadeiro medo não está em nossa inadequação, mas no poder e potencial que temos para impactar positivamente o mundo ao nosso redor.

On July 12, 2008, the world lost an incredible talent. A renegade physician, a pioneer, the father of open-heart surgery, and perhaps the best surgeon who ever lived, Dr. Michael DeBakey died of natural causes at 99. Because of his groundbreaking research, cutting-edge medical devices and maverick approach to cardiac surgery, DeBakey literally changed the rules of the game and thousands of lives are saved each day.

What can we learn from Michael DeBakey’s life and career?

1. Build your brand.

With a career that spanned more than 70 years, DeBakey built a reputation for being indispensable. His patients included everyone from the ordinary person next door and people with no means to a list of Who’s Who among world leaders. Presidents Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon, President Boris Yeltsin, King Hussein of Jordan, the Shah of Iran, Turkish President Turgut Ozal, just to name a few, engaged DeBakey because they knew he was the best. The Journal of the American Medical Association said in 2005, “Many consider Michael E. DeBakey to be the greatest surgeon ever.” Is your personal brand strong enough that if you left your company, colleagues and customers would have a difficult time getting along without you?

2. Be a guru, thought leader, industry expert.

Dr. DeBakey published more than 1,000 medical reports, research papers, chapters and books on topics related to cardiovascular medicine. He helped establish the National Library of Medicine, the world’s largest and most prestigious repository of medical archives. DeBakey played a key role in organizing a specialized medical center system to treat soldiers returning from the war. This system is now the Veterans’ Administration Medical Center System. For his numerous contributions Dr. DeBakey was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, Congress’ highest civilian honor, the National Medal of Science, the country’s highest scientific award, and The United Nations Lifetime Achievement Award. Do people see you as a guru in your field? How distinctive is your knowledge base? How well do you garner, contribute and leverage knowledge?

3. Never quit learning.

As a child, DeBakey was required to borrow a book from the library each week and read it. He read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica before entering high school. Overseeing cases, consulting with colleagues and mentoring younger surgeons, he made his mark on the world right up to the end. DeBakey performed his last surgery at age 90 and continued to travel the globe giving lectures. Perhaps you’re thinking, “Who would want a 90-year-old surgeon operating on them?” The answer could be, “Someone who’s performed more than 60,000 cardiovascular procedures in his career.” Do you have a reputation for lifelong learning, for continually adding value? When we stop bringing something new to the game, the game is over.

4. Risk more, gain more.

DeBakey took risks others weren’t willing to take to advance medicine. Tubing, clamps, pumps, protocols all bear the mark of DeBakey’s passion for innovation. Yet, product and process innovations often pull people out of their comfort zones and some of DeBakey’s early breakthroughs weren’t accepted initially—in fact they were ridiculed. For example, in 1939, when Drs. DeBakey and Alton Ochsner linked cigarette smoking to lung cancer, many in the medical community derided it. Then in 1964, the Surgeon General confirmed their findings and documented the cause and effect. There was also skepticism when DeBakey discovered that he could substitute parts of diseased arteries with synthetic (Dacron) grafts—a procedure that enables surgeons to repair aortic aneurysms in the chest and abdomen. He initially figured out how to stitch synthetic blood vessels on his wife’s sewing machine. Now the procedure is widely used. DeBakey was also the first to perform bypass surgery and the first to perform a successful removal of a blockage of the carotid (main) artery of the neck, a procedure that has become the standard protocol for treating stroke. The world is not changed by those who are unwilling to take risks. Is your passion for advancing your field by taking a risk bigger than your fear of rejection or making a mistake?

5. Refuse to sell out on your dream.

DeBakey developed an interest in medicine in his father’s pharmacy where he listened to physicians talk shop. The vision to become a doctor was clear, the question was, “what kind?” In 1932, there simply wasn’t anything you could do for heart disease, if a patient had a heart attack the long-term prognosis wasn’t good. While he was still in school in 1932, DeBakey invented the roller pump—a critical part of the heart-lung machine that takes over the functions of the heart and lungs during open-heart surgery. This not only created the era of open-heart surgery, it cemented DeBakey’s passion to make a mark in the world of cardiovascular medicine. Engagement is about pouring your heart, mind and soul into a dream that causes you to fire on all cylinders. Does your career fulfill your desires? Or, have you sacrificed a dream that could make you come alive for a life of duty and routine that simply “works”?

6. Play to your genius.

DeBakey said, “I like my work, very much. I like it so much that I don’t want to do anything else.” Most people who are happy in life spend time doing what they love. This usually makes them extremely good at what they do. Dr. DeBakey exemplified the power of what can happen when our work requires what we are good at and passionate about. Playing to your genius is about using your gifts and talents to pursue a passion that makes a significant contribution to the people and the world you serve. Playing to your genius also promotes autonomy and self-direction, cultivates commitment, stimulates personal growth and makes work fun. Are you engaged in work you’re good at and passionate about—work that makes a contribution and needs to be done? Or are you just biding time?

7. Balance passion with discipline and focus.

With regard to his patients, the indefatigable DeBakey had an uncompromising dedication to perfection. He was known as a taskmaster who set very high standards, yet he never demanded more from others than he demanded from himself. Heart surgeons who trained under DeBakey say he was hard to keep up with when making patient rounds. They joked that he was from another world because he could maintain his focus and intensity for hours. In a world of competing priorities and information overload it’s easy to lose focus and get distracted. But, if you are playing to your genius and doing what you love, it’s easier to be disciplined and maintain a maniacal focus. Are you disciplined? Do you have a maniacal focus? Would your customers (internal and external) say you are relentless when it comes to pursuing perfection?

8. Find a void and figure out how to fill it.

Michael DeBakey’s innovations are on par with the likes of Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Jonas Salk, Henry Ford and Alfred Nobel. During World War II, he helped establish the mobile army surgical hospitals or MASH units. He was a key player in the development of artificial hearts, artificial arteries and bypass pumps that help keep patients alive who are waiting for transplants. He was among the first to recognize the importance of blood banks and transfusions. He also helped create more than 70 surgical instruments that made procedures easier and clinical outcomes more effective. If something couldn’t be done, DeBakey found a way to do it. In 1967, Dr. Christiaan Barnard performed the first human heart transplant in South Africa. Dr. DeBakey was among the first to begin doing the procedure in the United States. The problem was that recipients’ bodies rejected the new organs and death rates were high. In the 1980s cyclosporine, a new anti-rejection drug paved the way for organ transplants. Again, DeBakey was among the first to develop new protocols and advance the field of heart transplants. Where are the gaps in your organization or industry? What would happen if you developed a reputation for filling these voids?

9. Show people that their work matters.

Michael DeBakey is known not only for his prolific contributions to the medical field, but also as a symbol of hope and encouragement to his colleagues. Many years ago a colleague of ours shadowed Dr. DeBakey for a day at The Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas. He was struck by DeBakey’s capacity to affirm each person he saw in the course of the day. In one particular encounter, DeBakey began chatting with an elderly janitor who was sweeping the floor. DeBakey asked the man about his wife and children. He told the older man, obviously not for the first time, that the hospital couldn’t function without the janitor because germs would spread, increasing the chances of infection in the hospital. Later in the day, our colleague tracked down the janitor and asked him, “What exactly do you do? Tell me about your job.” With pride, the janitor replied: “Dr. DeBakey and I? We save lives together.” He’s right. After all, consider what would happen to our healthcare systems if the cleaning crews went on strike. DeBakey understood that showing the janitor exactly how he contributes to a larger, more heroic cause is crucial. This creates a powerful dynamic. Realizing that he is working toward a worthy goal, the janitor’s perceptions about his work changed. It had new meaning and his enthusiasm for the job was rejuvenated. Great leaders make time to help people see how their work is connected to something bigger. For a surgeon like DeBakey, those five or ten minutes each day were costly, unless, of course, you consider the productivity generated by a janitor whose work has been transformed. Right now, how many people in your organization are engaged in work that five years from today no one will give a rip about? Can you make the link between what you do and a noble or heroic cause? Can you make this link for others?

10. Be generative—inspire others to pursue the cause.

Generativity is the care and concern for the development of future generations through teaching, mentoring, and other creative contributions. It’s about leaving a positive legacy. All great leaders are generative and Michael DeBakey was no exception. He inspired many medical students to pursue careers in cardiovascular surgery. His reputation brought many people to Baylor College of Medicine and helped transform it into one of the premier medical institutions in the world. DeBakey trained and mentored almost 1,000 surgeons and physicians. In 1976, his students founded the Michael E. DeBakey International Surgical Society. Many of his residents went on to serve as chairpersons and directors of their own successful academic surgical programs in the United States and around the world. Are the people you’ve touched in your career learning, growing and making a difference as a result of your influence? Have they been inspired to build a better world than the world they inherited? Michael DeBakey applied his problem-solving skills to many parts of medicine that have changed our way of life. Timothy Gardner, M.D., president of the American Heart Association said it well, “DeBakey’s legacy will live on in so many ways—through the thousands of patients he treated directly and through his creation of a generation of physician educators, who will carry his legacy far into the future. His advances will continue to be the building blocks for new treatments and surgical procedures for years to come.”

Michael DeBakey’s life and legacy proves that one person who chooses to play to their genius can change the world and make it a better place for all. What legacy will you leave behind?