- Joined
- Mar 21, 2015
- Messages
- 2
- Reaction score
- 0
The Title saids it all. Just wanted to know so I can become that kind of surgeon since whatever kind of surgeon that do the most work, is the one that is doing the most helping.
What kind of surgeon do the most work and training?
- Thread starter Sora Takumi
- Start date
- Joined
- Mar 9, 2014
- Messages
- 605
- Reaction score
- 742
OBGYN
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2009
- Messages
- 1,974
- Reaction score
- 2,680
Mohs surgeons
- Joined
- Sep 29, 2014
- Messages
- 433
- Reaction score
- 847
Those that specialize in Craniorectal Inversion reconstruction. Clearly, too few of them out there. Don't know about $$, but they're greatly needed.
- Joined
- Apr 9, 2000
- Messages
- 39,952
- Reaction score
- 18,717
C'mon guys - you aren't being very helpful to our international member.
The truth is that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" to use an American idiom. For the patient suffering from painful, bleeding hemorrhoids, the colorectal surgeon is the most helpful. To one with a malignancy, a surgical oncologist might be.
As far as doing the "most work", that depends on how you define it - by hours worked per week, number of cases, or number of people helped.
The truth is that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" to use an American idiom. For the patient suffering from painful, bleeding hemorrhoids, the colorectal surgeon is the most helpful. To one with a malignancy, a surgical oncologist might be.
As far as doing the "most work", that depends on how you define it - by hours worked per week, number of cases, or number of people helped.
- Joined
- Sep 29, 2014
- Messages
- 433
- Reaction score
- 847
Ok. (But I stand by my post that a surgeon who could correct craniorectal inversion would be the most helpful and having the largest case-load. Would lead to world peace, as far as I'm concerned.)
1. Define 'doing the most work.' I mean, you could always be a plastic surgeon and spend 16 hours a day doing nothing but botox and be going through thousands of patients a year...but I don't know that it would meet your definitions of 'work and helping.' What about 'helping.' Prolonging life? Improving quality of life? Saving great numbers of lives? In general, surgeons tend to prolong lives/improve the qualities of lives on an individual basis. If you are looking to decrease mortality for a great number of people, my honest advice is to work in sanitation engineering in a major city in country with a low GDP. How many thousands of kids die due to diarrheal illness that could be prevented by better sanitation? Seriously, garbage and sewage workers are some of the biggest unsung heroes in the world.
2. Once you better know what you mean by helping - and if you want to help in a way that surgery does - you can better address the question. Still coming from an international perspective, it's difficult for me, an American in an American health system to answer the question. Are you interested in a residency in the US? Then likely GS is the route most open to you (and who knows how long that will last). Are you interested in a surgical career in your own country? I have no idea how surgical education works in most other countries.
3. So, in the US the main categories of surgical residency are:
General Surgery. Tends to deal with surgeries of the chest, abdomen, pelvis, soft tissues. Fellowships available in: colorectal, trauma, critical care, minimally invasive, pediatric, surgical oncology, plastics, vascular, cardiothoracic, hand, breast, endocrine, transplant and others. I'm sure you can see how general surgery can be "helpful" for a lot of people. For example, colorectal surgeons are important when it comes to dealing with colorectal cancer; also super important for people looking for surgical options for IBD, fecal incontinence. And, yes, hemorrhoids. Having your hemorrhoids fixed can lead to significant improvement to quality of life; definitely helping people in my book. Trauma/critical care - most trauma is non-operative, but trauma surgeons definitely do 'save lives.' Critical care management is also critically important and very helpful. Pediatric surgery - while many life-threatening peds conditions are rare, peds surgeons definitely save lives and improve the quality of life; and those whose lives are saved can go on to live another 60-80 years that would otherwise not be seen. Plastics - definitely improves quality of life and can be about much more than the cosmetic procedures. Breast - saves lives, improves quality of life. All of these can see tons of patients dependent on desired practice pattern.
Plastics, vascular, and cardiothoracic also offer integrated residencies.
Orthopedic Surgery. Deals with bones and joints. Versatile field, though, that's easily 'helpful' from the perspective of improving quality of life. Also, lots of opportunity for ortho to make dramatic changes in life quality in countries with lower GDP. Can make people walk again, and that's pretty cool. Pretty helpful, too.
Neurosurgery. Brain, nerves, spinal cord.....stuff. Lots of opportunities for saving lives and improving quality of life. Operations range from fixing aneurysms to discectomies to craniotomies and shunt placement and tumor resection and a heck of a lot more. Again, opportunities for making people walk, making them seizure free, decreasing pain. A pretty helpful specialty overall, I'd say.
Otolaryngology. Ear, nose, throat. These surgeons take out adenoids and tonsils; remove gnarly head and neck cancers; or can implant cochlear devices and lessen deafness. Personally, I think that's very helpful.
Urology. Deals with the kidneys, bladder, prostate, urethra. Kidney stones, my friend. Those things hurt like the dickens and if you can't pass them, the "Flow Show" guys will go after them. Super helpful - great improvement in life quality and also life saving. Removing kidney cancers - also life prolonging. Again, I think it's a pretty helpful specialty.
Overall, there's just not one type of surgeon that does the most helping. There's no easy formula to calculate number of lives saved or amount of life improvement based on case load performed by any one surgeon or any surgical specialty. Residency is a lot of work for everyone and then the number of cases that one does depends on one's location, practice pattern, and desires. And case load can conflict with length of training. In terms of longest training....you can always make your training fairly long. One of the longer paths that comes to mind would be GS+ research (7 years) + CT (3 years) + another research fellowship (1 year) + peds CT (2 years). I'm sure examples of longer paths could be found.
TLDR - Depends on your definitions. Question probably unaswerable. I think sanitation engineers do a lot of good work and help people.
1. Define 'doing the most work.' I mean, you could always be a plastic surgeon and spend 16 hours a day doing nothing but botox and be going through thousands of patients a year...but I don't know that it would meet your definitions of 'work and helping.' What about 'helping.' Prolonging life? Improving quality of life? Saving great numbers of lives? In general, surgeons tend to prolong lives/improve the qualities of lives on an individual basis. If you are looking to decrease mortality for a great number of people, my honest advice is to work in sanitation engineering in a major city in country with a low GDP. How many thousands of kids die due to diarrheal illness that could be prevented by better sanitation? Seriously, garbage and sewage workers are some of the biggest unsung heroes in the world.
2. Once you better know what you mean by helping - and if you want to help in a way that surgery does - you can better address the question. Still coming from an international perspective, it's difficult for me, an American in an American health system to answer the question. Are you interested in a residency in the US? Then likely GS is the route most open to you (and who knows how long that will last). Are you interested in a surgical career in your own country? I have no idea how surgical education works in most other countries.
3. So, in the US the main categories of surgical residency are:
General Surgery. Tends to deal with surgeries of the chest, abdomen, pelvis, soft tissues. Fellowships available in: colorectal, trauma, critical care, minimally invasive, pediatric, surgical oncology, plastics, vascular, cardiothoracic, hand, breast, endocrine, transplant and others. I'm sure you can see how general surgery can be "helpful" for a lot of people. For example, colorectal surgeons are important when it comes to dealing with colorectal cancer; also super important for people looking for surgical options for IBD, fecal incontinence. And, yes, hemorrhoids. Having your hemorrhoids fixed can lead to significant improvement to quality of life; definitely helping people in my book. Trauma/critical care - most trauma is non-operative, but trauma surgeons definitely do 'save lives.' Critical care management is also critically important and very helpful. Pediatric surgery - while many life-threatening peds conditions are rare, peds surgeons definitely save lives and improve the quality of life; and those whose lives are saved can go on to live another 60-80 years that would otherwise not be seen. Plastics - definitely improves quality of life and can be about much more than the cosmetic procedures. Breast - saves lives, improves quality of life. All of these can see tons of patients dependent on desired practice pattern.
Plastics, vascular, and cardiothoracic also offer integrated residencies.
Orthopedic Surgery. Deals with bones and joints. Versatile field, though, that's easily 'helpful' from the perspective of improving quality of life. Also, lots of opportunity for ortho to make dramatic changes in life quality in countries with lower GDP. Can make people walk again, and that's pretty cool. Pretty helpful, too.
Neurosurgery. Brain, nerves, spinal cord.....stuff. Lots of opportunities for saving lives and improving quality of life. Operations range from fixing aneurysms to discectomies to craniotomies and shunt placement and tumor resection and a heck of a lot more. Again, opportunities for making people walk, making them seizure free, decreasing pain. A pretty helpful specialty overall, I'd say.
Otolaryngology. Ear, nose, throat. These surgeons take out adenoids and tonsils; remove gnarly head and neck cancers; or can implant cochlear devices and lessen deafness. Personally, I think that's very helpful.
Urology. Deals with the kidneys, bladder, prostate, urethra. Kidney stones, my friend. Those things hurt like the dickens and if you can't pass them, the "Flow Show" guys will go after them. Super helpful - great improvement in life quality and also life saving. Removing kidney cancers - also life prolonging. Again, I think it's a pretty helpful specialty.
Overall, there's just not one type of surgeon that does the most helping. There's no easy formula to calculate number of lives saved or amount of life improvement based on case load performed by any one surgeon or any surgical specialty. Residency is a lot of work for everyone and then the number of cases that one does depends on one's location, practice pattern, and desires. And case load can conflict with length of training. In terms of longest training....you can always make your training fairly long. One of the longer paths that comes to mind would be GS+ research (7 years) + CT (3 years) + another research fellowship (1 year) + peds CT (2 years). I'm sure examples of longer paths could be found.
TLDR - Depends on your definitions. Question probably unaswerable. I think sanitation engineers do a lot of good work and help people.
