The senior medical student is hours into her on-call shift on her surgical rotation. She’s been up since four, exhausted, and can’t remember if she had eaten anything since breakfast. The staff surgeon on call “pimps” her on sur…
Category: surgery
How accelerated learning platforms are pushing surgical education forward
Surgical training has long been confined to traditional models of Halstedian apprenticeship, where trainees are guided—but also potentially limited—by their superiors. Within this dynamic, the transfer of knowledge from expert to learner is dependent o…
Coaching or mentorship: What is the solution for physicians? [PODCAST]
Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Catch up on old episodes! “Over the years, I have mentored a lot of trainees. After discovering coaching and seeing my career transform after I started working with a coach, I have become a coach myself. I def…
Wisdom from 50 years a doctor [PODCAST]
Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Catch up on old episodes! “This last doctor was also the happiest doctor I have ever met. He was not a youngster but had a wonderful following of patients and was loved by the entire hospital staff. And he had…
When was the last time you wore a white coat?
When the COVID-19 pandemic began to dominate all aspects of health care, many of our colleagues opted to wear scrubs instead of their routine work attire and white coats. They cited concerns about personal infectious risk and not wanting to bring the v…
What if we asked patients what they want?
Historically, the Canadian health care system has decided what should be done for the care of the population. Who gets care, when and where, what is a priority, what delays are tolerable, and what degree of saturation is acceptable in a Quebec emergenc…
Does your OR case scheduling process need a revamp?
I’ve been in the health care industry for over a decade. Starting a few years ago, I embarked on a new project: building a case scheduling platform specifically for anesthesia staff. I’ll be the first to say that I never envisioned myself b…
Does your OR case scheduling process need a revamp?
I’ve been in the health care industry for over a decade. Starting a few years ago, I embarked on a new project: building a case scheduling platform specifically for anesthesia staff. I’ll be the first to say that I never envisioned myself b…
It’s called crying and it’s normal
Doctors treat people in all types of situations. Life or death. Sometimes both. Babies die, children die, and teenagers die. Women die. Men die. Sometimes you even have the misfortune of delivering a stillborn. Everyone experiences death, but for docto…
Big Joe: living proof of a surgeon’s fallibility
When I think of Big Joe, I see his overalls and how he filled them. And how a couple of months after I operated on him, there was room for both of us in there. Big Joe: farmer, salt of the earth, tough, stoic. And now, bright orange. My initial recomme…
