It is a known fact that professionals are extremely busy people. They constantly move and thrive around a very fast-paced environment and for long hours of the day. They were trained for so many years to adapt and function in a very cut-throat and competitive environment.
A perfect example would be medical professionals. Before they became medical professionals, they were once students in college who were pursuing an undergraduate degree in a medical course. Pursuing an undergraduate study could take up to 4 years of college, then they can get a bachelor’s degree in science.
After their undergraduate studies, they proceed to undergo training in medical establishments in order to get experiences and they could get their master’s degree after this. These additional years of studying could take about more than 4 years and could go up to 6 years, depending on the surgeon’s specialty or expertise they wanted to pursue.
These types of experiences means that the graduate students or they are called residents or doctors in training, are working alongside other medical professionals or their seniors in order to learn from them. Their seniors serve as their guide as well as strict mentors who help in instilling the practices and ethics to be learned in the medical field. These lessons and experiences will help the doctors in training or residents to be the best future medical practitioners and ensure a bright future for the medical field.
Once the long and heavy training in the medical establishments is over, the doctor in training or resident will finally be able to attain their license to become an official doctor. In this article, it will be discussing surgeons, specifically.
What Are Surgeons and What Do They Do?
Do you know what a surgeon is? A surgeon is a medical professional who is responsible for treating a patient’s condition and disease through the process of surgery. Surgeons are also considered as doctors although they have an advanced level of training which is why surgeons are in a much higher rank and authority than other medical staff in general.
Surgeons operate on patients every single day. Even if it is just a simple diagnosis to the most extreme surgical operations. They work directly with patients in order to assist them with their medical needs as well as advise them about the surgical process that the patient needs. This also serves as a way to gain the patient’s trust because they know how surgery can be a really intimidating process.
Speaking of intimidating, not only that patients are scared of what will occur during the surgery, it is for certain that the surgeon who will perform the surgery of the patient is quite scared, too. It is very understandable to feel that way since surgeons are entrusted to a really difficult task and that is to ensure that an extremely difficult way for treating a disease will be successful and not risk a person’s life. Being entrusted to a person’s life is a huge responsibility after all.
How Long Do Surgeons Operate on Their Patients and How Do They Endure it?
Performing surgery is not an easy job. Sure, surgeons trained for so many years so that they could perform surgery once they get their license but that does not mean a surgery, even the simplest surgical procedure is pretty quick to finish. Surgery takes so much time and it could not be rushed because the internal system of the body of a person is extremely delicate and if a surgeon did a sloppy job just to finish the surgery right away, well then, chances are, they would cause complications to their patients and could worsen their situation.
This is why a surgery takes so many hours to finish. The duration of a surgical process could range from 2 hours up to more than 26 hours. Yes, it can sometimes take a day and in other difficult surgical procedures, it could take days.
But how do surgeons be able to keep on performing the surgical operations on their patients if it takes so long to finish them?
To answer that question, within a hospital, there is such a thing called “surgical teams” which composed of the lead surgeons, the one who has the authority in that team, next is the doctor or doctors in training to assist the lead surgeon, they can help with the cleaning of wounds, passing of tools, and to stitch the patient up, next is a nurse, to help with assisting surgeon in the surgical process, another member is the anesthesiologist, a medical professional who is responsible for giving patients anesthesia or painkillers to sedate them and not let them feel any pain during the surgery, and lastly, other medical staffs who are responsible for cleaning the tools and machines that will be used in the surgical process.
They have these surgical teams in order to make the surgical process easier, systematic, and organized because the surgeon could not only do it alone, especially if the surgery to be performed will be difficult.
If the surgical team performs a difficult surgical procedure and it has been so many hours, some of the members of the surgical team can actually take a break, get a quick snack or drink but the lead surgeon will still remain in the operation room to perform the surgical procedure. (Take note, that even if the members of the surgical team are allowed to take a break that does not mean they can go all at once, the surgeon still needs some assistance)
In other surgical operations, just like what was previously mentioned before, some surgical procedures could take a day or more to finish, a different team of surgical members could also take their turn in performing the surgical procedure and let the previous surgical team to rest.
This rotation process or taking a turn is done until the surgical process is finally over and every medical professional who performed the procedure could finally take a break then wait for the next operation for them to perform.
Sources:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/how-surgeons-make-it-thro_b_11181004
