Category: surgery

Bridging the rural surgical care gap with rotating health care teams

Compared to urban areas, rural communities had a 21 percent higher rate of deaths due to heart disease and a 15 percent higher rate of cancer deaths from 2001 to 2019. The per capita number of general surgeons decreased from 6.4 to 5.2 per 100,000 popu…

If I had to choose: Choosing the patient over the protocol

It was after dinner at The Goring, just the three of us—Ulla, David Chipp, and me. The kind of dinner where the wine lingers longer than the food, and the conversation slips into the quietly personal. David, once Reuters’ correspondent in Peking …

Hope is the lifeline: a deeper look into transplant care

A few months after meeting her during rounds at a dialysis center, an elderly woman gripped my hand and quietly asked, “Do you think I’ll make it in time?” Her voice trembled. She had been silent for weeks, worn down by dialysis and o…

A surgeon’s startling ketamine experience [PODCAST]

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! General surgeon Arthur Williams discusses his article “A surgeon’s battle with ketamine-induced hallucinations.” He shares an account from his novel of a…

Normalizing male plastic surgery in Africa

Aloma Isaac Junior, a Nigerian comedian popularly known as Zicsaloma, recently underwent rhinoplasty. This intervention exposed deep-rooted biases about masculinity, beauty, and body autonomy in Africa. Instead of curiosity or support, his decision was…

The hidden financial burdens shaping modern medicine

Imagine this: Two attending surgeons undertake a surgical procedure on a patient. The surgical residents have draped the patient; the surgical tech and the circulating nurse are ready to begin the operation. The surgical attendings enter the OR, scrub …

How operational inefficiencies are undermining patient trust and care

As I step into my fifth year of superspecialty surgical practice in corporate hospitals, I find myself reflecting on a recurring challenge that has profound implications for both patient care and professional satisfaction. Despite clinical expertise an…

Why patients choose the surgeon, not the hospital

It was a Sunday morning, a rare moment of leisure for a young surgeon stepping into the fifth year of his superspecialty practice. Sitting with his family, savoring the tranquility of a slow day, he felt grateful for the pause. But as the evening crept…

Peer review case: a surgeon’s fight for due process

We recently resolved a complex peer review case involving a surgeon in a Midwestern state. The case arose as the hospital began transitioning to an employed-physician model, seeking to phase out its non-employed, voluntary medical staff. Our client, a …

How to make life-and-death decisions with confidence [PODCAST]

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! We explore the high-stakes world of life-and-death decisions in medicine with William O. Collins, an otolaryngologist and airway surgeon. Drawing from personal experiences…