Goodbye, surgery, hello medicine?
Wendy was right in some respects, I think. I believe that I am a surgeon deep down; I am impatient, demanding, simple, all with an unshakeable belief in efficiency, in the ability to cure somebody with a stroke of a knife or sizzle of the Bovie. I love anatomy, I like the abdomen, I enjoy the OR. My current attending on Colorectal thinks I am a surgeon at heart; many of my classmates are surprised when they hear I'm not going into surgery after all. My former surgeon mentors too, are a bit disappointed. Even my mom laughs and says that I would make a good surgeon. As tired as I am (and even sick now), I still enjoying my surgery rotation. A lot.
But no one has really asked me why- or in this case, why not. Why not surgery? After all, I can tell you why I'm going into GI medicine. It's easy. I love GI and liver pathology. I love clinic and spending time with patients. I love the way GI docs approach patients. I love scopes- and I have never felt the same thrill holding a laprascopic camera/instruments as I have the scope. And I had a fantastic time on my GI rotation.
Why not surgery? And I've been thinking about it, wondering what has changed within me. It's not just that surgery is not GI, you know? I mean, god, there's something special about Trauma- stapling some bowel, stitching a liver, digging a bullet out of someone's skin, even changing a wound vac, or having your hand on a guy's heart just before it beats its last... and on some ethereal level, you can't compare that to sticking a long camera up someone's butt. It just doesn't compare. No question, Trauma was awesome.
So why not surgery? And I've been thinking about it, and I know it can't just be because of the bad residents or attendings I've run into. Bad residents and attendings abound everywhere- we can take a random sample of the Medicine department here and alarm bells should be going off everywhere. Granted, there were some overworked, haranged, tired, annoying ones on surgery too, but I also had some of the best I've had all year on surgery (Nia, Dr. Inaba, Dr. Demetriades, oh hell, let's just say "Trauma"- comes to mind).
But then why not surgery? If it's not something outward, then what is it that really stopped me from picking sugery? After much thought (granted, I've been thinking about this for at least 10 weeks now)... I think I know exactly what it is. It's one of those self-realization moments, an epiphany about who I am and who I want to become. And yes, I am all of those things- impatient, efficient, hard-working, demanding, tactile, with all those qualities one would typically attribute to surgery, but I'm not just those things. I love thinking through GI/liver problems. I want to become something even more, in that I want to learn how to think about things, how to approach complex problems. I want to become a GI doctor. I want to go beyond things that require a more simple algorithm and move beyond to complexity. To distill it down, you could even say that I am surgeonesque, aspiring to be medicinesque.
I've always been drawn to complex problems, but I haven't ever been patient enough to sift through all of them, so I want to learn. I want to train myself to do so, and I think medicine is the best road for that. Granted, I'm dreading the medicine residency more than anything (endless rounding with discussions that really shouldn't be discussions in the first place?)... but I believe it will make me a better doctor. The ultimate in doctoring, I think, is good medicine, something, which, like surgery, requires practice. And I want to practice with complex problems. I would get bored with surgery. Even if it is a bowel resection. It's not just the frustration in watching people doing things and the "I could do it better" factor; rather, it's the ambition in me that wants to say, "I could be good at it- no, I am the best at it." It, being, of course, medicine.
Funny thing, isn't it? Growing up in a family of surgeons, that I'd want to do something a bit more complicated. Or maybe it's that I just don't have their endurance. I've always believed that anyone can be a surgeon as long as they worked hard; technique is mastered through practice. But having seen my uncle and my dad work, I realized that in order to become a great surgeon, one needs to think as well (my uncle being better at it than my dad). The same thing applies, I think, for internists as well- thinking, sometimes, in the internist's case, is overrated, and a bit of action is subsequently required.
Perhaps then, I should simply strive to be the best- regardless of whatever it is.
But no one has really asked me why- or in this case, why not. Why not surgery? After all, I can tell you why I'm going into GI medicine. It's easy. I love GI and liver pathology. I love clinic and spending time with patients. I love the way GI docs approach patients. I love scopes- and I have never felt the same thrill holding a laprascopic camera/instruments as I have the scope. And I had a fantastic time on my GI rotation.
Why not surgery? And I've been thinking about it, wondering what has changed within me. It's not just that surgery is not GI, you know? I mean, god, there's something special about Trauma- stapling some bowel, stitching a liver, digging a bullet out of someone's skin, even changing a wound vac, or having your hand on a guy's heart just before it beats its last... and on some ethereal level, you can't compare that to sticking a long camera up someone's butt. It just doesn't compare. No question, Trauma was awesome.
So why not surgery? And I've been thinking about it, and I know it can't just be because of the bad residents or attendings I've run into. Bad residents and attendings abound everywhere- we can take a random sample of the Medicine department here and alarm bells should be going off everywhere. Granted, there were some overworked, haranged, tired, annoying ones on surgery too, but I also had some of the best I've had all year on surgery (Nia, Dr. Inaba, Dr. Demetriades, oh hell, let's just say "Trauma"- comes to mind).
But then why not surgery? If it's not something outward, then what is it that really stopped me from picking sugery? After much thought (granted, I've been thinking about this for at least 10 weeks now)... I think I know exactly what it is. It's one of those self-realization moments, an epiphany about who I am and who I want to become. And yes, I am all of those things- impatient, efficient, hard-working, demanding, tactile, with all those qualities one would typically attribute to surgery, but I'm not just those things. I love thinking through GI/liver problems. I want to become something even more, in that I want to learn how to think about things, how to approach complex problems. I want to become a GI doctor. I want to go beyond things that require a more simple algorithm and move beyond to complexity. To distill it down, you could even say that I am surgeonesque, aspiring to be medicinesque.
I've always been drawn to complex problems, but I haven't ever been patient enough to sift through all of them, so I want to learn. I want to train myself to do so, and I think medicine is the best road for that. Granted, I'm dreading the medicine residency more than anything (endless rounding with discussions that really shouldn't be discussions in the first place?)... but I believe it will make me a better doctor. The ultimate in doctoring, I think, is good medicine, something, which, like surgery, requires practice. And I want to practice with complex problems. I would get bored with surgery. Even if it is a bowel resection. It's not just the frustration in watching people doing things and the "I could do it better" factor; rather, it's the ambition in me that wants to say, "I could be good at it- no, I am the best at it." It, being, of course, medicine.
Funny thing, isn't it? Growing up in a family of surgeons, that I'd want to do something a bit more complicated. Or maybe it's that I just don't have their endurance. I've always believed that anyone can be a surgeon as long as they worked hard; technique is mastered through practice. But having seen my uncle and my dad work, I realized that in order to become a great surgeon, one needs to think as well (my uncle being better at it than my dad). The same thing applies, I think, for internists as well- thinking, sometimes, in the internist's case, is overrated, and a bit of action is subsequently required.
Perhaps then, I should simply strive to be the best- regardless of whatever it is.