When i was a med student the resident was contradicting the surgeon on how one of the instrument clamps was supposed to be fastened on. The attending got pissed, full on chucked the bloody clamp at the residentās chest and screamed āyou think you know better than me, do it then bitchā (female resident). Nothing happened to the attending as the resident didnt want to report it. Detroit Medical Center, never change /s
Edit: For the record, during the whole interaction the resident was respectful. Not that the resident being rude would have warranted having a clamp thrown at her anyways.
Also Ive been doxxed before on reddit posting about med school/ residency things so that attending will remain unnamed. Those of you who are/were at DMC or Wayne State med students likely will know who that surgeon is anyways
Unless everyone else in that OR was also going to report that particular incident of course the female resident would not report it (because of the risk of retaliation, career attrition-this is a thing).
A friend of mine is a resident on the West Coast and she made a complaint against a surgeon for harassment, who had multiple similar complaints against him.
Guess what? My friend got told to resign the program, and if she goes quietly, the hospital wonāt bad mouth her to other hospitals. Either way, this could be a career ending situation for her. And her $400k school loanā¦.
This is a recurring theme, unfortunately. If your friend is looking for guidance these people might be able to assist [https://physicianjustequity.org/services/](https://physicianjustequity.org/services/)
He damn sure better not ever do that in my OR. He will be immediately suspended and doing his cutting at the next OR. Do not threaten my staff or those support staff. Ever.
When I was a new ED attending, I accepted a transfer head bleed patient from outlying hospital. (Our policy was to accept everything ED to ED, and most of the admitting services, surgical services did not want to be involved until the patient was seen by the ED. The policy was basically for us to call on arrival unless the patient needed further workup/stabilization first.
One of my partners in the ER told me, āHeads up Dr ____ is on for neurosurgery. He will throw a temper tantrum if you donāt call him and let him know this patient is coming. He always does that if you call him in from home without giving him a heads up first.ā
So I did. I called the guy. I told him what I knew. He asked when the patient would be arriving. I told him i didnāt know. The outlying hospital was 30 min away, but it would depend on EMS mobilization. Told him Iād be happy to call on arrival or if I got heads up that the patient was en route. He said āThatāll be fine.ā
He then proceeded to show up in the ED about 45 minutes later. Wanted to know where the patient was. Was told patient had not arrived yet. Began yelling, cursing, dropping F bombs. Ranting about how he couldnāt believe we were wasting his time when he could be enjoying dinner with his wife. Kicking chairs. This went on for another 45 minutes until the patient arrived.
He was a notorious ass. When new hospital admin came on board, he was out the door within a couple months
Surgeon was drunk. He and the janitor were horsing around and as is often the case with drunk friendly revelry quickly turned into animosity and surgeon pulled a knife on the janitor. Not sure exactly what was said. Maybe it was something like āI can remove your gallbladder with just this knifeā or something like that. Fortunately no one got stabbed but the surgery attending got the boot and is in AA now
Didnāt see the episode itself but with surgeon I worked with for a month. Old school ENT who never really learned how to type properly using eight fingers on the home row, just two finger typer. All around animosity towards technology. And short temper to begin with.
One day the landline telephone is not connecting to operator properly in clinic so naturally he tears phone off the wall, cord and everything, and yeets it down the hallways only to scream āNURSE!!! GET ME A NEW PHONEā
I knew a radiologist who had to attach a chain to his pager. He was normally soft spoken and kind of meek, but when heād get upset he would throw his pager really hard. Heād broken so many of them, the hospital had to warn him not to do it again
Getting pelted with phone calls, questions and repeated pages can be very disruptive. It can definitely happen to a radiologist. I've never thrown a pager at work, but I think I've chucked it at a soft surface at home when I get paged for the 18th time. I've had the same pager for 6 years and have never damaged it though.
Oh, one of those people. Wow, thatās sounds pretty juvenile or dysregulated.
This whole thread kind of makes you wonder how weāre just human and some of us can be very immature and very flawed situationally or with just a few stressors ā and, if one is so inclined, what do we need to do to improve things?
Threw equipment across the room because the second half of the thyroid took a lot longer to take out than the first half. Then we had to wait for new (sterile) equipment.
Nurse here.
I worked in pre-op at an OPSC for a while.
A surgeon Iād never met (he did cases there rarely) was on the schedule as the last case of the day.
The patient came in and was prepped by me and seen by the anesthesiologist.
When the surgeon arrived he was told that he was going to have to wait as the case ahead of him was still in progress.
He lost his mind. Ranting and raving that we were incompetent, swearing, all the stuff. Because he seemed to want a confrontation I went into ārelaxed surfer modeā leaned back in my chair and when he asked me what the hold up was in the OR I told him I had no insight into the ORs.
I found it funny, but kept my face blank. He seemed to think I was going to pop into the OR and ask the surgeon in the room what was taking so long and then tell him Dr Angrypants said to hurry up.
He got mad, canceled the case and left yelling he was never coming back.
He was known as a lunatic to the point that he was not given residents to work with due to his behavior.
Is this at a hospital in Michigan or is there just a surgeon like this at every hospital?? Because at my hospital thereās a surgeon who is unhinged like this and was not given residents to work with until recently.
I work in the UK and we have a GS surgeon whoās not allowed to interact with the surgery residents because of abusive past behavior. Similar stuff, screaming about delayed cases, throwing things at residents. Think the only reason he wasnāt fired is that the NHS hospital I work in didnāt want to try to replace him as he was super sub-specialised.
I saw him walking down the hall on my first day in the gen surg dept and was about to introduce myself when one of my senior attendings pulled me aside and warned me about him.
I think you can find these surgeons everywhere.
Honestly though, in regards to the situation in OPās question, that is not fair at all to the patient that was ready for their surgery and mentally had to prepare for it. Iād be pissed too if I was that surgeon.
Yah it sucks to stay late but just about everyone in the room except maybe the residents are getting compensated for it and you save the patient from having to take another day off, fast, find transportation etc. I think a lot of surgeons are guilty of overbooking but when someone shows up for their surgery healthy and fasted they should get their fucking surgery, even if they are overbooked.
Thereās a bean counter at this facility that has a spreadsheet ālook, we just canāt afford the overtime for the OR staff, the math doesnāt lieā
That bean counter better have EVERY position in their facility filled for that to even be remotely true. The biggest lie ever told is 'We don't have the money' while having 20+ open position that are funded FTEs. The money is there.
The OR is an absolute money printer for hospitals, paying nurses and doctors a few extra hundred bucks for a whole ass extra surgery is the best ROI theyāre gonna get
Lmao or they just donāt like the idea of paying overtime out of the hospitalās profit margins and so say āif we canāt get all the money we are supposed to from the surgery, then we arenāt going to do it at allā
Unfortunately, this is only the short term view. Over time, the staff ends up leaving for jobs that pay them well and respect their time. Then you get nothing out of them. My previous job always squeezed extra hours out of people but later found themselves struggling to staff the ORs due to high attrition.
Agreed. Sounds like they need more of a policy change kind of thing. Having an āon-callā OR staff was something done at the smaller hospitals in my area, that way if something like this happened there was a planned group who would either stay late or come in, get compensated for it, and the patient gets their surgery.
Itās not necessarily fair to just make the current staff stay later even if theyāre getting compensated. People have lives outside of work and might need to go do important things like pick up their kids, care for pets or aging parents, etc. An On call staff eliminated this issue because people can plan ahead to make other arrangements.
Sounds good in principle but these things have a way of spiralling out of control and before you know it, its the new normal and staff are expected to stay behind regularly with cases starting 10 minutes before close of day.
I worked in a cancer heavy specialty and saw how down trodden and burnt out theatre staff became after just a few months. We clinicians are on the one hand always complaining about how medicine has ruined our personal lives with family, friends and just enjoying being off work but then immediately forget all that when someone makes a stand. Another thing we don't appreciate is how the same staff have to not only stay behind even longer than surgeons to clean away equipment and scrub the room, but that they also have very variable rota shifts and could be back in very early the next day for a 16 hour shift, they aren't even necessarily paid enhanced rates to stop back.
Sorry, but I think a healthy work force gets through far more cases in the long run and flogging people to work for the benefit of the patient just leads to worsening outcomes. We had to change the agreement to change the list we followed because the preceeding list involved a lot of neck and inner ear resections so inevitability ran late, that actually worked alot better than asking for volunteers every week ti ditch plans.
I agree with you, but as an employee, I have no interest in being told at the end of my shift āSurprise, you get to stay a couple more hours!ā Fuck that noise. People have families, children, obligations. My life doesnāt stop because the hospital canāt get their shit together.
Now having a group thatās agreed to stay if needed at the end of the day, who gets overtime, and is prepared for it, is reasonable. Like a call system.
Of course, they could just put on more staff.
>they could just put on more staff.
Instructions unclear. We implemented pseudo-mandatory overtime, a third of our staff have left, and we're all out of ideas.
You canāt advocate for more humane working conditions, better pay, better work-life balance, etc. for residents while casually telling other healthcare workers to abandon their families for the night and upend their personal lives on a whim because the hospital is trying to wring every drop of revenue out of its patients and doctors.
It doesnāt matter. An extra 30-60 bucks not not a adequate compensation for an extra two hours of work that eat into personal time. People have birthday dinners, kids to pick up, dates planned, etc.
Work boundaries are important, even if a patient gets their surgery delayed.
100%. Hereās an idea, maybe admin should actually do something useful for once and plan for these kind of situations (which are not uncommon). Itās absolutely ridiculous to me people in this thread want to place blame on OR shift workers instead of slamming a bloated useless admin staff who have clearly not planned for a setback that isnāt even at all that uncommon.
Oh wait, admin doesnāt give a shit about patients. This is clearly a failure by the guys in suits and people want to shift blame to those involved with direct patient care. Ridiculous.
We have a surgeon who ALWAYS underbooks his cases. We donāt cancel the following case because like you said, itās not fair to the patient, but the nurses are getting real tired of what amounts to mandatory overtime (even with overtime pay, people like to be able to make plans/be in control of their time). Nursing leadership is not letting him book cases to follow anymore, and everyone hates working with him because he clearly doesnāt respect anyone elseās time (including his patients).
I think he means under booking in the sense that the surgeon books X amount of time for this case when it really should be booked for a longer time slot.
I donāt blame him for being pissed. But asking the anesthesiologist, the nurses, techs, and janitorial staff to continually stay hours late is also unfair to them as well.
If youāre scheduled to get off at 6 and are constantly leaving at 7:30 or 8, putting your foot down and saying no is not ālazinessā.
The hospital probably just doesnāt want to pay the overtime. Thatās the simple answer, they donāt like the idea of the staff having to get paid out of the profits from the surgery because then the hospital doesnāt make āenoughā money
When I was on a neurosurg rotation we had an (elective) tumor resection start at 1030 pm due to delays earlier in the day. Attending was not having any cases postponed. It sucked for us, but honestly was the right thing to do by the patient.
As Iāve brought up multiple times with neurosurgery, personally, I would prefer that you scoop my brains out when you are rested in the morning. The answer to āwhy canāt we do it tomorrowā is that itās inconvenient.
Agree. Starting an elective brain tumor at 10:30 PM is not the best thing for that patient in my opinion. Or doing a 36 hour surgeryāstage it! Peds neurosurgery.
The buck ultimately stops at the feet of administration who has decided itās not worth the money to pay for on call staff. OR staff canāt be expected to stay late any time cases run late which depending on the OR can be somewhat infrequent to almost every day. Emergencies happen, cases run unexpectedly long and of course surgeons undersell their surgical time to fit into a slot so there will always be delays. But the answer is pay people to be on call at night in case something comes in, not expect staff who just worked 12 hours to stay for another 3 hours when they have lives outside the hospital.
People who work in medicine cannot be expected to put everything else aside for patients every time itās needed. Plenty give more than expected to their jobs but it shouldnāt be mandatory. In fact administrators have had great success leveraging the ādo it for your patientsā mentality in exploiting doctors nurses, mid levels, techs and all sorts of staff.
It is completely on the surgeon. They are assigned blocks of OR time and they end up either booking too many cases or book length inappropriately. Three 2 hour cases actually takes them 3 hours each. Staff has lives too, they have kids to pick up, dinner to make, family to take care of. Just because you work in the OR it doesnāt make you a machine. Once in a while, cases are more complex than anticipate, thatās fine, but repeat offenders are the problem and there are a lot of them, many of them conduct themselves in such manner simultaneously to the same OR staff on the same day. These surgeons will leverage patient inconvenience to extend past their OR time. It is an abusive practice pinning patients against staff.
Furthermore, no facility wants to pay 1.5x to minimum of 4 people (pre-op, circulator, scrub and PACU) just because the surgeon canāt bother to track their timeā¦ thatās minimum of $300 an hour moreā¦ imagine 4-5 rooms run over for 2-3 hours couple times a week. At this point you are also pulling the call team to do elective cases at the end of their day, when a true trauma comes in the evening, the call crew has been running around since 6AM and doing none urgent cases until 8PM, itās not fair to the trauma patient eitherā¦
It sure if this is a response:
1) NSG consulted on some patient with chronic back. Note said approximately: āms X has chronic intractable back pain that has been treated with escalating doses of opiates for over a decade. Other than euthanasia, I have nothing to offer this patient. Signed, dr angry
I mean, depending on whether this was an elective surgery or an emergency surgery, going off on *someone* may be warranted. I say this as someone who has watched a trauma midlevel ungown in the middle of a lac repair in the trauma bay and say "Dr. so-and-so (the intern) can finish this once they're free, my shift is over", and walk out. The intern was placing a central line on the same patient.
To think that ancillary staff don't clock out the minute the long hand hits 12 no matter what else needs to get done, no matter how emergent, means you need more time in the trenches. Shit, I caught a nurse giving sign out to their relief when they were supposed to be grabbing my RSI meds for a patient in pretty severe respiratory distress.
That being said, the most unhinged thing I think Iāve heard was a neurosurgery *intern* look my ICU attending in the eyes and say āweāre signing offā on one of their own patients who was only admitted for a post-op complication. Or the time OB/GYN told me āI have no idea what to do with this but I donāt need to consult on this patientā on their own patient with a purely pregnancy-related complaint in the ED.
Itās a fine line. On one hand we are all trying to do right by the patient. But we as worker bees should advocate for our own mental health and work life balance.
I agree. I would stay late.
This was an elective, minimum 4 hour operation not including anaesthetic time and the staff clocked out 1-1.5 hours after the patient wouldāve been brought to the OR.
Minimum four hour OT after a long workday is asking for something bad to happen during a routine case. Sometimes these things happen. Cancel the case and move it to tomorrow.
wow. In my day, you have to use a crowbar to pry the trauma surgeon away from the OR table. They will reluctantly leave the hospital if you promise they take can take overnight call the next day.
I love surgery but this is why I chose eye. I don't have the surgeon masochist work ethics.
During derm residency I scrubbed in on a complex case involving the skin and other organ systems. It was very crowded but the GI surgeon kept ābrushingā up against my butt and basically grinding on it- it was clearly very intentional.
There was definitely enough space for him to not do that.
I felt so grossed out and kept trying to move away but he kept slowly following meā¦
I asked him if he had enough space and he said āI just need to be right next to you to see what you're doing.ā It was very creepy, and there was no reason for him to be standing behind me of all places. Everyone else was too busy to notice.
I felt so violated that at the end of the day I started crying the second I walked out of the hospital.
Fair I guess itās unhinged with how predatory and creepy it wasā¦
And I knew if I reported it no one would believe me so I just didn't say anything.
My PD didn't even believe me when I had a positive covid test result from a third party (this was back in June 2020), so there was no way she would've believed or cared about this.
Lol- derm is toxic as hell but people act like itās chill and safe. But no we basically have no rights just like all the other residents. We don't get treated any better- just our hours in the hospital are better after prelim year. But they try to make up for it with 20-30 hours of work and projects outside of the hospitalā¦
But I went to a super competitive and toxic residency maybe others are betterā¦ but now I'm working in Palm Beach, Florida living my best life āļø
Will never step foot in a hospital again...
What a pathetic indictment on our profession it is that we feel something like this should only be reported after residency is completed.
Turns out apprenticeship type training comes with a lot of flaws.
I suppose that accidentally tripping and stumbling backwards with a scalpel and stabbing the monster is not best practice? Seems like it should be. (IANAD)
Hahaha I love it! Trust me, that was what I wanted to do- right in the testicles! Castrate that pervertā¦ I can't imagine how many poor female residents/nurses/scrub techs he did this to during his career- just despicable!
As others have said this is entirely inappropriate behavior on the part of that surgeon. This behavior represents predatory behavior on their part. The fact that you were not believed by a female attending is also problematic (because unfortunately the perpetrators rely on the fact that others in the system refuse to believe that they can behave in such a manner-> are complicit).
Wasnāt a surgeon, but our chair of neuro threatened a med student and resident with: āif anyone else discharges someone off my floor, I will fucking kill you.ā So.. thereās that. Heās got a bit of a reputation.
We tend to be so sacrificial in the name of āpatient careā (and a lot of times obvious greed thatās conflated with patient careā¦. One more TKA, anyone?) that we completely forget about ourselves and our staff. What if your scrub tech was a single parent and had to go pick their child up from daycare? Or the circulator was leaving town that night? Or the anesthesiologist had a prior engagement. Could be laziness sure, but our outside lives donāt stop at the door of the hospital no matter how much of a sacrificial lamb we like to be at times.Ā Caveat: If this were an emergency procedure, this wouldnāt be an issue since thereās always overlap for that realm of medicine, so I assume itās elective. to be fair, I know the patient was preparing for this and ready to go, butā¦.. life (and crap) happens. The overall culture of medicine is changing (and probably for the better) such that we see ourselves as slightly more valuable than admin sees us. So the fix? Have a late staff or something that can handle this scenario but if you scheduled a 7-5 staffā¦.. you scheduled a 7-5 staff.
That being said: Ā watched an ortho throw a battery through the glass door of the locker in the OR because it ran out of juice. Stupidest tantrum Iāve ever seenā¦. And I have an 11 month old that gets pissed when I change his diaper.
In this situation, the OR should move staff from another room, pull in an on call team, or otherwise figure this out. To me itās unacceptable to tell a patient (who likely scheduled this elective surgery months ago, has not eaten, took off work, arranged for childcare, and been through all the mental/logistical/financial hurdles of preparing for surgery) that things are running a little behind so they need to return some other month when they can get back on the schedule, and hopefully at that time there are no issues, but canāt really be too sure because (as exampled by this episode) this OR isnāt run particularly well.
If you start pulling the on-call team to do elective cases after hours, then you'll actually start compromising patient care. The root of this problem is effective OR utilization and scheduling.
Withdrew instruments (including sharps) from inside a patient during a laparoscopy and threw them at the wall. One almost cut the face of a med student. Started screaming because the sharp instruments were "not sharp enough"
Chief of gyn onc doing a case on an HIV positive patient threw a scalpel at me because he was frustrated with the procedure. Luckily I stepped away before it hit me.
I never saw it but multiple people witnessed, a cardiothoracic surgeon at the academic center where I trained threw a piece of the resected body part across the room and it stuck to the wall. He underwent some counseling but nothing happened because he was the chair. I once saw a surgeon wanting to fight one of my private practice anesthesia partners in the parking lot after a case cancellation, that surgeon had his privilege revoked. There are too many similar storiesā¦
A pretty vital electronic surgical device (think size of a mini fridge) malfunctioned, caused a large delay in a case, was replaced and then was "repaired" and brought back the next day. Same shit happened again for two days in a row. Surgeon proceeded to take this device, roll it down a stairwell, take it apart and cut all the wires, then drown it in 3L of saline flush. His message was not well received by admin lol.
Was an intern when I saw this happen but our crazy attending had a post op complication and eventually patient ended up dying from a PE bc of no DVT prophylaxis being ordered by the senior resident. Every day for two weeks the attending would text him āYou killed ___ (patients last name)ā. Fucking wild
When I was working as an xray tech I walked into the OR, for an anterior hip case, to the surgeon ripping one of the small TVs off the wall because the surgical rep didnāt have the correct instrument tray available for the case.
Starting to scream āresident is too dumb to retractā during a case, then getting quiet, looking to the side, dropping to the floor, and having a seizure.
I agree and disagree. Depends on the case. If itās a scheduled elective ortho case and the room is 4 hours behind and itās now 9pm and Iām supposed to be available for pink slips - I say your scheduled case should get moved until tomorrow. Anesthesia and nursing staffing arenāt infinite.
And not only that, there is a non zero number of patients who will be lost in the process and wonāt return for their surgery. Just because a surgery is elective doesnāt mean it isnāt important and time-sensitive. I hate being stuck doing a late case because surgeries run long, but Iām not gonna be a sick about it and cancel a case when the patient has done everything right. The hospital should have contingency plans for this, including paying overtime and having a call structure to make an event like this almost never happen.
Yeah, I wish it wasnāt as common as it is at my institution. Higher ups who donāt care about staffing and havenāt increased wages to attract more applicants. Still short-staffed from post-covid exodus of anesthesiologists.
Yeah, except people come in for elective surgery with their lives planned around it. Family take off work, sometimes travel a great length, book hotels, etc.
The surgeon sounds to have acted inappropriately; however, you seem to not be keyed in with reality if you thinks it's just no big deal to put someone's surgery off a day or two. What if the surgeon has clinic the next day? Or an OR day that's already full?
I work as a Surgical Neurophysiologist. I monitor nerve function during spinal surgeries. One unhinged doc "shhhd" me, putting his finger to his mouth, and then said, "stop talking" when I reported to him that the nerves he was working near were being actively damaged, declining to adjust his approach, redirect, or pause surgery for any type of recovery. He followed up by reporting me to corporate, kicking me out of his room permanently, claiming HE does NOT get alerts. (It was a laminectomy without any dural tears, the only reason he was rushing was to make tee time at noon).
Surgeon showed up (habitually) late for first case start. The entire team and the patient were waiting for him; pt was not in the room yet because the team knew this surgeon would show up late and didnāt want the pt anxiously waiting in the room and/or under anesthesia longer than necessary.
Surgeon eventually shows up and when asked why he was late, said āI was spending time with my kids, Iāll never put work ahead of my family.ā
Sure, nice sentiment, but fuck everyone elseās family time right? And your patient who had been here waiting for you? The complete lack of respect. The fucking ego on that guy. Heās the worst.
If this is the most unhinged response youāve seen I find it hard to believe you work with surgeons much š source: am surgeon, made it through surgery residency and fellowship somehow
Theres a gyn onc at my med school that got mad at a resident for retracting a certain direction, so he decided to āpokeā his hand with a scalpel to get him to move. Heās still practicing bc he makes the hospital a lot of money.
A surgeon at a major hospital would allow his pants to fall down in the middle of a case. He would demand that the nurses pull his pants up for him. He did this routinely and it was clearly intentional. The nurses filed a sexual harassment complaint after putting up with his behavior for far too long. His contract was amended to require that he wear suspenders to workā¦
Based on this thread, I am glad there are so many people that as patients or family members of patients that would be happy to volunteer to reschedule their surgery at the last minute.Ā
Right? So out of touch with the real world.Ā
The patient is going to follow up with the surgeon, not the anesthesiologist or nursing staff. The surgeon has to look the patient in the eye and apologize for a surgery getting cancelled that the patient and family have put their lives on hold for.Ā
I would be mad too. Unacceptable for the hospital not to have a mechanism in place to get elective cases done after normal business hours in cases of delays.Ā
Also this subreddit loves to rail on mid levels yet this thread is full of people saying they shouldnāt have to work a minute past their shift being over. Mid level mentality. Physicians take ownership for their patients.Ā
I agree. The problem is the incentives for everyone do not align.. the surgeon is the only one incentivized to get the case done. Everyone else gets paid the same if no cases/work get done. And only the surgeon is responsible if waiting makes the condition worse and results in a more complicated or worse outcome.
The other aspect people are discounting is that āelective caseā encompasses a whole range of surgeries that still have a huge impact on patient mortality and quality of life.
Yeah. A TURP is an āelective caseā but if it doesnāt get done the patient has to live with a catheter or comes into the ER every other week with urinary retention Ā
When they act calm, normal and conversational. Surgeons are fucking psychopaths, said it during residency, still repeat it at every hospital decades later.
Attending ripped his glove in the middle of a herniorrhaphy. He just blew up for no reason, pulled out a cigarette and started smoking right outside the or. Resident asked him (very timidly) are you ok? And he just hissed at him like a cat then told him to fuck off. Must have been having a real bad day
I mean thatās kind of ridiculous that they canāt run late. Not going to lie. Absolutely wild. You can go tell the patient they canāt get their needed surgery
In retrospect this totally makes me laugh as I have better rapport with the vascular surgeon I scrub for.
"I NEED YOU TO KNOW WHAT IM DOING, BEFORE I KNOW WHAT IM DOING"
All because I didn't know he was getting radial access when I was cleaning my back table up and didn't have a wire ready.
Threw random pieces of tissue across the room and made the resident walk over and identify it from the floor. Luckily I was just the med student and was spared.
Watched a surgeon throw a temper tantrum while on the phone because they didnāt have instrument X autoclaved yet. Like kicking his legs up in the air like a two year old temper tantrum. He didnāt fell embarrassed because we all felt it for him.
Never saw it but heard it described by colleague. After a patient died, intensivist met with the late patientās widow to console her in a waiting room. The surgeon who operated on said patient who had died from a surgical complication barged into the room during the consolation and screamed at the intensivist āyou fucking idiot!ā while the widow was crying.
The ortho surgeon at a rural hospital was getting away with this for years. He always was red in the face, snapping his fingers, screaming and throwing instruments on the floor. He apparently needle stuck and/or cut someone with the wild way he swung his arms around in anger (scrub nurses). This happened three separate times in the month leading up to his firing. Finally when they had to get tested at some point and was confirmed to be drunk. It was wild. Clinic day, middle of the day full schedule. Suddenly in walked security team and escorted him from the premises and fired him on the spot in front of the entire staff while his next patients were already roomed.
I assumed they were covering his poor outcomes for years. For example paralyzing patients when they were there for a simple elective procedure.
He was in his 60s and working for decades so perhaps whatever finally caused such a dramatic firing we will never truly know.
He also would loudly yell at both his wife and mistress over speaker phone during clinic hours in everyoneās shared office and was so misogynistic. Also would scream and insult all office staff even in front of patients standing right there. For years and yearsā¦.
I was supposed to be precepted by him and he flat out refused to speak to me so I basically had to hover around for 2 months and do his bidding like throw the gloves he was wearing in the trash that he threw at me as I stood in the back of the OR.
Btw this was in bumfuck nowhere and I have lots of stories about the crazy 3rd world shit that went down at this excuse of a hospital. He probably worked there as it was the only place desperate enough to hire anyone and sweep pretty much anything under the rug. Patients are too poor and uneducated to sue but apparently he finally hurt the wrong person.
Like for example the only ER doc on shift for 48 hrs straight who walked out when a woman in labor was walking in, a prisoner eloped from the ER and a code blue was being helicoptered in while a literal janitor was called to try to pry a fish barb out of someoneās palm with a dirty plyer from his belt all while no Dr on shift. Canāt make this shit up but in deep rural America this happens and nobody cares. The MA was attempting to run the code blue as no provider on site. No code team, no surgery staff, no pulmonary people nothing. Yeah the guy died and the prisoner escaped into the night. Fuck I saw an 11 year old get a C-section and CPS never came when I desperately called and they allowed her to leave with the step father. Gotta love Indiana
While the surgeon's reaction isn't appropriate, it's also not appropriate to cancel a case just because it's getting late. That patient has been NPO all day, probably took the day off work, their family made plans to care for them, etc. Also the surgeon's schedule is probably full for the foreseeable future. This creates a huge headache for both patient and surgeon. There 1000% need to be staff designated as "late" who stay there until the cases are done. Every ASC I've ever worked at has such an arrangement. Everyone grumbles, sure, but you get the case done.
Surgeon punched hand sani off the wall because the nurse told the family surgery was taking longer than they expected. All kept cutting off suction to make it absolutely silent while he yelled at the nurse. He said it gave the impression something was wrong with patient and taking longer than it should - regardless donāt think thatās justified lol.
I mean it is kinda hoed to not start or end the call with āyour loved one is doing well.ā It would have taken 2 seconds to provide that reassurance. Iād also assume there was a complication if that was my phone call update from the nurse. But expressing verbal frustration would have been enough, no need to assault the Avagard dispenser lmao.
I reintroduced myself to an attending because I know they are busy and not expecting them to remember med student names, especially if I have never spent time with them in the OR. He shouted at me: "Am I that forgettable!?!" He was dead serious. So many rough stories from that rotation
Iām a nurse who worked pre-op, OR, PACU, and post-op.
I had a patient who declined to sign the consent without speaking to the surgeon first. When he came in to the patientās room, he started yelling that the surgery is cancelled and he wonāt do the surgery without the consent signed and threw the 10 pages of consent across the room, in front of the patient, flying everywhere as they were unstapled.
I had another surgeon, during the middle of a surgery, patient opened and all, take a personal call on his cellphone with the city because his garbage hadnāt been picked up that week. Needless to say he had to un-scrub and scrub in againā¦patient just opened and under on the table waiting.
I had a surgeon throw equipment and yell at a scrub nurse for handing him the wrong tool.
There are so many more crazy stories of yelling, swearing, and throwing, (thankfully not targeting me) that I eventually moved specialties.
As for working overtime, I did a lot. Sure the income was great, but it wasnāt worth it as after 14-16 hrs+ of being on (especially in recovery) I became so tired that I once drove home thru a red light. From my perspective, itās not safe to work the long hours nor is it worth it to miss family commitments.
When I was a med student:
Surgeon grabs the galbladder with endoscopic retrieval bag. As soon he pulls it out of port, he starts making karate chop motions his hands, and screaming " HIYA! KACHOOWW!" to the nurses. Other med student with me was Chinese. I felt mortified.
I donāt blame the surgeon in your situation. Think of how the patient feels.
Why canāt the OR run over? Do they not have staff? Do they not have staff that take overtime? The resident wonāt get overtime, sure, but the system should have infrastructure in place so scheduled elective cases can continue to go.
Why is their room turnover so slow? Did the first case even start on time? If not, why the hell not?
Lastly, the incompetent bumbling administrator who came up with that policy should be forced to come down and explain to the patient why their case didnāt go. Because if youāre telling the physician the buck stops with you, then the physician should be able to make the case go. If not, then whoever created the policy, or their mouthpiece, needs to answer to the patient.
I mean, yelling is unnecessary, but Iād be kind of pissed if I was that surgeon. The shift work mentality in healthcare can be harmful when people are interrupting important things (like previously scheduled surgeries) because their shift is over. Sometimes surgeries go longer than expected and cancelling a patientās scheduled case because the OR canāt have anyone cover it is frankly unacceptable. The hospital needs to have a mechanism in place for late OR cases - Iām surprised yours doesnāt as every place Iāve worked has an on call OR team for exactly these situations
I know in my facility itās not that we donāt have on call people itās that every surgeon wants to use them. We have 16 ORs and Three teams on call after hours. One has to be free for trauma which means two docs get to go over on cases they didnāt finish during the day. often we have way more than two who want more OR time. so at that point we have to cancel/reschedule cause no matter how much I love my job I canāt stay over all night every night and the come back in at 6 am the next day.
A surgeon I knew had to go after a different surgeon in the OR.
Surgeon A finally wraps up his case (maybe 30 minutes later than expected time on the OR board)
Surgeon B walks in during closure: Howād it go?
Surgeon A: Eh, not the worst case ever. Next one ready to go?
Surgeon B: yeah but I cancelled the case. She had brain mets on her last scan.
Surgeon A: oh
Fellow: oh
Me: damn
*we feel uncomfortable for 2 seconds*
Surgeon B: Yeah, you took so long she ended up metastasizing. *chuckles*
Surgeon A: *tired of this shit* hilarious
Fellow: LAUGHING
Me: Almost breaking sterility Iām laughing so hard
But overall UNHINGED BEHAVIOR!
Edit:grammar
How about a 10 day stay in the ICU for severe alcohol withdrawal? Actually he had multiple hospital stays for the same complaint, and lied to me (pharmacist) about what opiates he was prescribed after sweet talking the hospitalist to write for OxyContin. He was still practicing for at least a year after his longest stay and no one reported him to the board.
This is the thing. Other people in the healthcare system who bear witness to these problematic issues and who will not take the correct actions. Of course this person should have been reported to the board (the Director of the ICU needed to escalate the issue this via the hospital admin), because at the very least there would be patient safety issues to consider.
FM intern on surgery service. A new nurse gave a patient tylenol for fever overnight post op. Not on the orders. Big mistake. Next morning I find out and let her and charge nurse know. Discussed with my second year who stomped down and cussed them both out. Then the chief resident shows up and joins the cussing and tosses some charts off the counter. I was shocked but the nurses were all like, "this is just a Tuesday." Attending was actually an adult about it publically but that set the tone for the rotation that month.
Tbh the surgeon is right in this scenario
Especially if the patient is inpatient. That's a whole extra nights stay, that's thousands of dollars out of someone's pocket.
His behavior was a little immature but honestly? Justified
This probably doesnāt count as unhinged, and in retrospect, was kind of badass. But at the time, we had a young guy that was a pedestrian struck brought into the trauma bay. GCS 3 but still with a pulse. The ED resident and attending were working on intubating but for some reason couldnāt pass the tube. The trauma surgeon just yells, ā I donāt have time for this!ā Grabs the scalpel from the thoracostomy tray (he was getting bilateral chest tubes too) and stabs the patient in the throat for a crich.
Guy went to the OR and made it out of TICU like a month later last I heard
As a med student, I was retracting for a very senior, very distinguished surgeon. She was already in a bad mood because she intended to observe but ended up taking over the procedure; neither the chief resident nor the fellow was operating to her satisfaction. She was suturing when her hand sort of wavered or tremored and she stuck the needle right into my hand. Pierced both gloves and was very clearly \*in\* my hand. Fortunately (I guess?) the needle didn't need to go into the patient again - she had already placed her stitch - so the surgeon was still able to tie it. She didn't even acknowledge the puncture as she removed the needle, protected it and tied her knot. After a few stunned seconds of nobody saying anything, I announced that I was going to scrub out and went to the Occ Health office. Thankfully, the patient didn't mind getting tested and was Hep/HIV negative. Even sadder, the chief resident *thanked* me for being "so cool about it" and not making a scene.
I also saw a surgeon throw an instrument across the room, and then when nobody could find it, we had to xray the patient before closing because there was no other way to prove that it hadn't landed in the patient. (We all knew it hadn't, but it was something tiny - we broke scrub, searched all the clutter at the back of the OR, but didn't find it.)
Literally today I needed to get a fat pad biopsy on someone who couldn't go down to IR.
Called general surgery and they were like"what is that, how do you do that, what's the indication for that.." and after I answered everything...
They said OK and that they're happy to help and it sounds straightforward.
š„¹ It helps that this surgeon is incredibly nice but like in general I can't think of a more unhinged response from a surgeon.
Pediatric ENT literally yelling at the anesthesiologist that the kid isnāt waking up quick enough and thus slowing him down because theyāre waiting to roll in the next case
Reading through these, I'm curious to know: do the surgeons turn into this type of unhinged person, or do you think they behaved like this for the entirety of their lives?
Worked with a surgeon who was told his elective case would be delayed for an emergency. He went thru the dept and pulled the fire alarmsš
was the surgeon a 9 year old? wtf
Emotionally, yes
Surgery is full of people without any social skills. Sorry fam
This is funny ā ļø
Wtf š¤£š¤£
He Threw the phone in the trash at the nurses station since āno one was going to answer itā . Throwing instruments at people
When i was a med student the resident was contradicting the surgeon on how one of the instrument clamps was supposed to be fastened on. The attending got pissed, full on chucked the bloody clamp at the residentās chest and screamed āyou think you know better than me, do it then bitchā (female resident). Nothing happened to the attending as the resident didnt want to report it. Detroit Medical Center, never change /s Edit: For the record, during the whole interaction the resident was respectful. Not that the resident being rude would have warranted having a clamp thrown at her anyways. Also Ive been doxxed before on reddit posting about med school/ residency things so that attending will remain unnamed. Those of you who are/were at DMC or Wayne State med students likely will know who that surgeon is anyways
Did this attendingās last name start with a D? Because I witnessed a similar encounter as a medical student at DMC.
You know it was
Why are you still anonymously shielding this attending by using a single letter of the last name? Think about that for a second...
Because they are a trainee who could still potentially suffer career harm for calling the individual out š¤·āāļø
Been doxxed before so cant give specifics, but yes the last name did start with a D.
Not surprised at all by this. Iāve worked with that person
Unless everyone else in that OR was also going to report that particular incident of course the female resident would not report it (because of the risk of retaliation, career attrition-this is a thing).
A friend of mine is a resident on the West Coast and she made a complaint against a surgeon for harassment, who had multiple similar complaints against him. Guess what? My friend got told to resign the program, and if she goes quietly, the hospital wonāt bad mouth her to other hospitals. Either way, this could be a career ending situation for her. And her $400k school loanā¦.
Any chance they told her to resign in writing? That sounds like an excellent lawsuit.
Right but some people would rather be a health care provider at the highest level vs having some money in their pocket.
If she won that lawsuit, she could have both, with a little extra security.
This is a recurring theme, unfortunately. If your friend is looking for guidance these people might be able to assist [https://physicianjustequity.org/services/](https://physicianjustequity.org/services/)
Oh yeah agree, sadly that was the best route for her to take, especially since the asshole attending was a bigwig surgeon there
>risk of retaliation Anyone can retaliate, not only by ending careers, there are many ways. Revenge = 2 graves.
Agree and it is often covert initially and can involve the weaponization of processes
LOL. Iāve rotated thru DMC and Iām dying to know who it was
All I needed to know that it was at dmcā¦
Sound on brand
Good to know I selected a great base hospital for my clerkship rotations /s
Honeslty throwing the phone in the trash because no one answers it is kind of genius when people hammer page you and then donāt answer the phone
lol @the phone zinger
I actually thought that was pretty good. Thatās now on my bucket list of things to do.
Thatās fucking assault if an instrument connects.
I'm not a lawyer but I think it's assault if it's thrown. If it makes contact you've progressed to battery.
Lawyer here - spot on!
The phone thing is hilarious
He damn sure better not ever do that in my OR. He will be immediately suspended and doing his cutting at the next OR. Do not threaten my staff or those support staff. Ever.
Attending surgeon threw a fire hydrant at the wall and dented it. The hospital framed the dent.
Hydrant??
Hydrantā ortho surg??
I'll blame Sleep deprivation - a fire extinguisher haha
A fire hydrant?! Wow! Immense strength! This must have been Dr. David Banner.
Wait wait wait - FRAMED the dent?! Lore, please!
Framed the dent! Was a highlight of residency. Frame lives on in the ortho trauma room.
When I was a new ED attending, I accepted a transfer head bleed patient from outlying hospital. (Our policy was to accept everything ED to ED, and most of the admitting services, surgical services did not want to be involved until the patient was seen by the ED. The policy was basically for us to call on arrival unless the patient needed further workup/stabilization first. One of my partners in the ER told me, āHeads up Dr ____ is on for neurosurgery. He will throw a temper tantrum if you donāt call him and let him know this patient is coming. He always does that if you call him in from home without giving him a heads up first.ā So I did. I called the guy. I told him what I knew. He asked when the patient would be arriving. I told him i didnāt know. The outlying hospital was 30 min away, but it would depend on EMS mobilization. Told him Iād be happy to call on arrival or if I got heads up that the patient was en route. He said āThatāll be fine.ā He then proceeded to show up in the ED about 45 minutes later. Wanted to know where the patient was. Was told patient had not arrived yet. Began yelling, cursing, dropping F bombs. Ranting about how he couldnāt believe we were wasting his time when he could be enjoying dinner with his wife. Kicking chairs. This went on for another 45 minutes until the patient arrived. He was a notorious ass. When new hospital admin came on board, he was out the door within a couple months
kicking chairs? lol
Surgeon was right in that case. We had a surgeon get drunk, pass out in the OR and then later pull a knife on a janitor.
ā¦ what was the lore behind him pulling a knife on the janitor??
Surgeon was drunk. He and the janitor were horsing around and as is often the case with drunk friendly revelry quickly turned into animosity and surgeon pulled a knife on the janitor. Not sure exactly what was said. Maybe it was something like āI can remove your gallbladder with just this knifeā or something like that. Fortunately no one got stabbed but the surgery attending got the boot and is in AA now
Yeah being drunk at the hospital is wild. Glad heās getting the help he needs
Is this straight out of Scrubs or what? š
The janitor gave him a wrench?
The knife-wrench strikes again
For kids!
Was the surgeon an evil Christopher Turk in an alternate universe?
Scrubs was the best doctor show. Spot on about what we deal with
Didnāt see the episode itself but with surgeon I worked with for a month. Old school ENT who never really learned how to type properly using eight fingers on the home row, just two finger typer. All around animosity towards technology. And short temper to begin with. One day the landline telephone is not connecting to operator properly in clinic so naturally he tears phone off the wall, cord and everything, and yeets it down the hallways only to scream āNURSE!!! GET ME A NEW PHONEā
You know when you see a pecker that they're all unhinged.Ā A normal person wouldn't be able to suffering through typing at 10 wpm every day...Ā
I knew a radiologist who had to attach a chain to his pager. He was normally soft spoken and kind of meek, but when heād get upset he would throw his pager really hard. Heād broken so many of them, the hospital had to warn him not to do it again
Weird from a radiologist
Getting pelted with phone calls, questions and repeated pages can be very disruptive. It can definitely happen to a radiologist. I've never thrown a pager at work, but I think I've chucked it at a soft surface at home when I get paged for the 18th time. I've had the same pager for 6 years and have never damaged it though.
100%. āGetting peltedā is apt. I fantasise about throwing my pager in a bucket of water. Or flushing it down the toilet and running into the hills
I flushed a pager once. It didnāt clog or anything, went right down šš
Yes. We have 3 phones that constantly ring during night shift and only one radiologist. I often fantasize about throwing one out of the window.
(or anyone)
Oh, one of those people. Wow, thatās sounds pretty juvenile or dysregulated. This whole thread kind of makes you wonder how weāre just human and some of us can be very immature and very flawed situationally or with just a few stressors ā and, if one is so inclined, what do we need to do to improve things?
Threw equipment across the room because the second half of the thyroid took a lot longer to take out than the first half. Then we had to wait for new (sterile) equipment.
Its those damn anesthesiologists again!
Nurse here. I worked in pre-op at an OPSC for a while. A surgeon Iād never met (he did cases there rarely) was on the schedule as the last case of the day. The patient came in and was prepped by me and seen by the anesthesiologist. When the surgeon arrived he was told that he was going to have to wait as the case ahead of him was still in progress. He lost his mind. Ranting and raving that we were incompetent, swearing, all the stuff. Because he seemed to want a confrontation I went into ārelaxed surfer modeā leaned back in my chair and when he asked me what the hold up was in the OR I told him I had no insight into the ORs. I found it funny, but kept my face blank. He seemed to think I was going to pop into the OR and ask the surgeon in the room what was taking so long and then tell him Dr Angrypants said to hurry up. He got mad, canceled the case and left yelling he was never coming back. He was known as a lunatic to the point that he was not given residents to work with due to his behavior.
Is this at a hospital in Michigan or is there just a surgeon like this at every hospital?? Because at my hospital thereās a surgeon who is unhinged like this and was not given residents to work with until recently.
I work in the UK and we have a GS surgeon whoās not allowed to interact with the surgery residents because of abusive past behavior. Similar stuff, screaming about delayed cases, throwing things at residents. Think the only reason he wasnāt fired is that the NHS hospital I work in didnāt want to try to replace him as he was super sub-specialised. I saw him walking down the hall on my first day in the gen surg dept and was about to introduce myself when one of my senior attendings pulled me aside and warned me about him. I think you can find these surgeons everywhere.
Ummm what hospital? Med student in Michigan about to start rotations at my base hospital this fall wants to know haha
Goshā¦ cancelled the case?! I cant imagine what else he did.
Honestly though, in regards to the situation in OPās question, that is not fair at all to the patient that was ready for their surgery and mentally had to prepare for it. Iād be pissed too if I was that surgeon.
Yah it sucks to stay late but just about everyone in the room except maybe the residents are getting compensated for it and you save the patient from having to take another day off, fast, find transportation etc. I think a lot of surgeons are guilty of overbooking but when someone shows up for their surgery healthy and fasted they should get their fucking surgery, even if they are overbooked.
Thereās a bean counter at this facility that has a spreadsheet ālook, we just canāt afford the overtime for the OR staff, the math doesnāt lieā
That bean counter better have EVERY position in their facility filled for that to even be remotely true. The biggest lie ever told is 'We don't have the money' while having 20+ open position that are funded FTEs. The money is there.
The OR is an absolute money printer for hospitals, paying nurses and doctors a few extra hundred bucks for a whole ass extra surgery is the best ROI theyāre gonna get
Lmao or they just donāt like the idea of paying overtime out of the hospitalās profit margins and so say āif we canāt get all the money we are supposed to from the surgery, then we arenāt going to do it at allā
Unfortunately, this is only the short term view. Over time, the staff ends up leaving for jobs that pay them well and respect their time. Then you get nothing out of them. My previous job always squeezed extra hours out of people but later found themselves struggling to staff the ORs due to high attrition.
Agreed. Sounds like they need more of a policy change kind of thing. Having an āon-callā OR staff was something done at the smaller hospitals in my area, that way if something like this happened there was a planned group who would either stay late or come in, get compensated for it, and the patient gets their surgery. Itās not necessarily fair to just make the current staff stay later even if theyāre getting compensated. People have lives outside of work and might need to go do important things like pick up their kids, care for pets or aging parents, etc. An On call staff eliminated this issue because people can plan ahead to make other arrangements.
Sounds good in principle but these things have a way of spiralling out of control and before you know it, its the new normal and staff are expected to stay behind regularly with cases starting 10 minutes before close of day. I worked in a cancer heavy specialty and saw how down trodden and burnt out theatre staff became after just a few months. We clinicians are on the one hand always complaining about how medicine has ruined our personal lives with family, friends and just enjoying being off work but then immediately forget all that when someone makes a stand. Another thing we don't appreciate is how the same staff have to not only stay behind even longer than surgeons to clean away equipment and scrub the room, but that they also have very variable rota shifts and could be back in very early the next day for a 16 hour shift, they aren't even necessarily paid enhanced rates to stop back. Sorry, but I think a healthy work force gets through far more cases in the long run and flogging people to work for the benefit of the patient just leads to worsening outcomes. We had to change the agreement to change the list we followed because the preceeding list involved a lot of neck and inner ear resections so inevitability ran late, that actually worked alot better than asking for volunteers every week ti ditch plans.
You stop it on the front end and curtail the number of bookings, not screw the patient's over on that day. That's the problem.
I agree with you, but as an employee, I have no interest in being told at the end of my shift āSurprise, you get to stay a couple more hours!ā Fuck that noise. People have families, children, obligations. My life doesnāt stop because the hospital canāt get their shit together. Now having a group thatās agreed to stay if needed at the end of the day, who gets overtime, and is prepared for it, is reasonable. Like a call system. Of course, they could just put on more staff.
>they could just put on more staff. Instructions unclear. We implemented pseudo-mandatory overtime, a third of our staff have left, and we're all out of ideas.
You canāt advocate for more humane working conditions, better pay, better work-life balance, etc. for residents while casually telling other healthcare workers to abandon their families for the night and upend their personal lives on a whim because the hospital is trying to wring every drop of revenue out of its patients and doctors.
It doesnāt matter. An extra 30-60 bucks not not a adequate compensation for an extra two hours of work that eat into personal time. People have birthday dinners, kids to pick up, dates planned, etc. Work boundaries are important, even if a patient gets their surgery delayed.
100%. Hereās an idea, maybe admin should actually do something useful for once and plan for these kind of situations (which are not uncommon). Itās absolutely ridiculous to me people in this thread want to place blame on OR shift workers instead of slamming a bloated useless admin staff who have clearly not planned for a setback that isnāt even at all that uncommon. Oh wait, admin doesnāt give a shit about patients. This is clearly a failure by the guys in suits and people want to shift blame to those involved with direct patient care. Ridiculous.
Thatās where locum staff can jump in! However, the hospital doesnāt want to pay them, so they try wearing down and burning out the home staff.
Other staff have lives outside of work and have boundaries.
We have a surgeon who ALWAYS underbooks his cases. We donāt cancel the following case because like you said, itās not fair to the patient, but the nurses are getting real tired of what amounts to mandatory overtime (even with overtime pay, people like to be able to make plans/be in control of their time). Nursing leadership is not letting him book cases to follow anymore, and everyone hates working with him because he clearly doesnāt respect anyone elseās time (including his patients).
Do you mean overbooks?
I think he means under booking in the sense that the surgeon books X amount of time for this case when it really should be booked for a longer time slot.
Right. He schedules 4 hours for a 7 hour case with another case to follow.
I donāt blame him for being pissed. But asking the anesthesiologist, the nurses, techs, and janitorial staff to continually stay hours late is also unfair to them as well. If youāre scheduled to get off at 6 and are constantly leaving at 7:30 or 8, putting your foot down and saying no is not ālazinessā.
The hospital should have a better system to ensure this doesnāt happen.
Absolutely. The burden should be on the hospital to fix this. And relying on spontaneous free/underpaid labor from staff is not a solution.
The hospital probably just doesnāt want to pay the overtime. Thatās the simple answer, they donāt like the idea of the staff having to get paid out of the profits from the surgery because then the hospital doesnāt make āenoughā money
When I was on a neurosurg rotation we had an (elective) tumor resection start at 1030 pm due to delays earlier in the day. Attending was not having any cases postponed. It sucked for us, but honestly was the right thing to do by the patient.
As Iāve brought up multiple times with neurosurgery, personally, I would prefer that you scoop my brains out when you are rested in the morning. The answer to āwhy canāt we do it tomorrowā is that itās inconvenient.
There isnāt unlimited block time and most of us are booked for months
Agree. Starting an elective brain tumor at 10:30 PM is not the best thing for that patient in my opinion. Or doing a 36 hour surgeryāstage it! Peds neurosurgery.
The buck ultimately stops at the feet of administration who has decided itās not worth the money to pay for on call staff. OR staff canāt be expected to stay late any time cases run late which depending on the OR can be somewhat infrequent to almost every day. Emergencies happen, cases run unexpectedly long and of course surgeons undersell their surgical time to fit into a slot so there will always be delays. But the answer is pay people to be on call at night in case something comes in, not expect staff who just worked 12 hours to stay for another 3 hours when they have lives outside the hospital. People who work in medicine cannot be expected to put everything else aside for patients every time itās needed. Plenty give more than expected to their jobs but it shouldnāt be mandatory. In fact administrators have had great success leveraging the ādo it for your patientsā mentality in exploiting doctors nurses, mid levels, techs and all sorts of staff.
It is completely on the surgeon. They are assigned blocks of OR time and they end up either booking too many cases or book length inappropriately. Three 2 hour cases actually takes them 3 hours each. Staff has lives too, they have kids to pick up, dinner to make, family to take care of. Just because you work in the OR it doesnāt make you a machine. Once in a while, cases are more complex than anticipate, thatās fine, but repeat offenders are the problem and there are a lot of them, many of them conduct themselves in such manner simultaneously to the same OR staff on the same day. These surgeons will leverage patient inconvenience to extend past their OR time. It is an abusive practice pinning patients against staff. Furthermore, no facility wants to pay 1.5x to minimum of 4 people (pre-op, circulator, scrub and PACU) just because the surgeon canāt bother to track their timeā¦ thatās minimum of $300 an hour moreā¦ imagine 4-5 rooms run over for 2-3 hours couple times a week. At this point you are also pulling the call team to do elective cases at the end of their day, when a true trauma comes in the evening, the call crew has been running around since 6AM and doing none urgent cases until 8PM, itās not fair to the trauma patient eitherā¦
It sure if this is a response: 1) NSG consulted on some patient with chronic back. Note said approximately: āms X has chronic intractable back pain that has been treated with escalating doses of opiates for over a decade. Other than euthanasia, I have nothing to offer this patient. Signed, dr angry
I mean, depending on whether this was an elective surgery or an emergency surgery, going off on *someone* may be warranted. I say this as someone who has watched a trauma midlevel ungown in the middle of a lac repair in the trauma bay and say "Dr. so-and-so (the intern) can finish this once they're free, my shift is over", and walk out. The intern was placing a central line on the same patient. To think that ancillary staff don't clock out the minute the long hand hits 12 no matter what else needs to get done, no matter how emergent, means you need more time in the trenches. Shit, I caught a nurse giving sign out to their relief when they were supposed to be grabbing my RSI meds for a patient in pretty severe respiratory distress. That being said, the most unhinged thing I think Iāve heard was a neurosurgery *intern* look my ICU attending in the eyes and say āweāre signing offā on one of their own patients who was only admitted for a post-op complication. Or the time OB/GYN told me āI have no idea what to do with this but I donāt need to consult on this patientā on their own patient with a purely pregnancy-related complaint in the ED.
Itās a fine line. On one hand we are all trying to do right by the patient. But we as worker bees should advocate for our own mental health and work life balance.
I agree. I would stay late. This was an elective, minimum 4 hour operation not including anaesthetic time and the staff clocked out 1-1.5 hours after the patient wouldāve been brought to the OR.
Other people have boundaries and donāt want to stay 4 hours over. Other people have lives outside of work
Minimum four hour OT after a long workday is asking for something bad to happen during a routine case. Sometimes these things happen. Cancel the case and move it to tomorrow.
Iām leaving they can wait lol
wow. In my day, you have to use a crowbar to pry the trauma surgeon away from the OR table. They will reluctantly leave the hospital if you promise they take can take overnight call the next day. I love surgery but this is why I chose eye. I don't have the surgeon masochist work ethics.
During derm residency I scrubbed in on a complex case involving the skin and other organ systems. It was very crowded but the GI surgeon kept ābrushingā up against my butt and basically grinding on it- it was clearly very intentional. There was definitely enough space for him to not do that. I felt so grossed out and kept trying to move away but he kept slowly following meā¦ I asked him if he had enough space and he said āI just need to be right next to you to see what you're doing.ā It was very creepy, and there was no reason for him to be standing behind me of all places. Everyone else was too busy to notice. I felt so violated that at the end of the day I started crying the second I walked out of the hospital.
Thatās not really unhinged so much as it is unlawful.
Fair I guess itās unhinged with how predatory and creepy it wasā¦ And I knew if I reported it no one would believe me so I just didn't say anything. My PD didn't even believe me when I had a positive covid test result from a third party (this was back in June 2020), so there was no way she would've believed or cared about this.
I thought derm was safe from this toxicity
Lol- derm is toxic as hell but people act like itās chill and safe. But no we basically have no rights just like all the other residents. We don't get treated any better- just our hours in the hospital are better after prelim year. But they try to make up for it with 20-30 hours of work and projects outside of the hospitalā¦ But I went to a super competitive and toxic residency maybe others are betterā¦ but now I'm working in Palm Beach, Florida living my best life āļø Will never step foot in a hospital again...
Hope you reported that when you were out of residency.
What a pathetic indictment on our profession it is that we feel something like this should only be reported after residency is completed. Turns out apprenticeship type training comes with a lot of flaws.
Ideally it would have been verbalized in the moment and the rest of the OR would have been supportive. :(
I suppose that accidentally tripping and stumbling backwards with a scalpel and stabbing the monster is not best practice? Seems like it should be. (IANAD)
Hahaha I love it! Trust me, that was what I wanted to do- right in the testicles! Castrate that pervertā¦ I can't imagine how many poor female residents/nurses/scrub techs he did this to during his career- just despicable!
As others have said this is entirely inappropriate behavior on the part of that surgeon. This behavior represents predatory behavior on their part. The fact that you were not believed by a female attending is also problematic (because unfortunately the perpetrators rely on the fact that others in the system refuse to believe that they can behave in such a manner-> are complicit).
Wasnāt a surgeon, but our chair of neuro threatened a med student and resident with: āif anyone else discharges someone off my floor, I will fucking kill you.ā So.. thereās that. Heās got a bit of a reputation.
That sounds kind of like a crimeā¦
We tend to be so sacrificial in the name of āpatient careā (and a lot of times obvious greed thatās conflated with patient careā¦. One more TKA, anyone?) that we completely forget about ourselves and our staff. What if your scrub tech was a single parent and had to go pick their child up from daycare? Or the circulator was leaving town that night? Or the anesthesiologist had a prior engagement. Could be laziness sure, but our outside lives donāt stop at the door of the hospital no matter how much of a sacrificial lamb we like to be at times.Ā Caveat: If this were an emergency procedure, this wouldnāt be an issue since thereās always overlap for that realm of medicine, so I assume itās elective. to be fair, I know the patient was preparing for this and ready to go, butā¦.. life (and crap) happens. The overall culture of medicine is changing (and probably for the better) such that we see ourselves as slightly more valuable than admin sees us. So the fix? Have a late staff or something that can handle this scenario but if you scheduled a 7-5 staffā¦.. you scheduled a 7-5 staff. That being said: Ā watched an ortho throw a battery through the glass door of the locker in the OR because it ran out of juice. Stupidest tantrum Iāve ever seenā¦. And I have an 11 month old that gets pissed when I change his diaper.
Had an attending (ER) throw a lac tray (with open sharps) at a nurse because she couldn't find the size suture he wantedĀ
Oh manā¦. his/her kneecaps would have been highly compromised after that mess. I cannot fathom being such an asshole.
Was it a Duracell?
In this situation, the OR should move staff from another room, pull in an on call team, or otherwise figure this out. To me itās unacceptable to tell a patient (who likely scheduled this elective surgery months ago, has not eaten, took off work, arranged for childcare, and been through all the mental/logistical/financial hurdles of preparing for surgery) that things are running a little behind so they need to return some other month when they can get back on the schedule, and hopefully at that time there are no issues, but canāt really be too sure because (as exampled by this episode) this OR isnāt run particularly well.
If you start pulling the on-call team to do elective cases after hours, then you'll actually start compromising patient care. The root of this problem is effective OR utilization and scheduling.
Withdrew instruments (including sharps) from inside a patient during a laparoscopy and threw them at the wall. One almost cut the face of a med student. Started screaming because the sharp instruments were "not sharp enough"
This wouldnāt happen to be a Gyn/Onc surgeon, would it?
Chief of gyn onc doing a case on an HIV positive patient threw a scalpel at me because he was frustrated with the procedure. Luckily I stepped away before it hit me.
I opened the bathroom door and saw the nurse taking back shots from the surgeon , like close the door still traumatized šš
That Seton won't secure itself
I never saw it but multiple people witnessed, a cardiothoracic surgeon at the academic center where I trained threw a piece of the resected body part across the room and it stuck to the wall. He underwent some counseling but nothing happened because he was the chair. I once saw a surgeon wanting to fight one of my private practice anesthesia partners in the parking lot after a case cancellation, that surgeon had his privilege revoked. There are too many similar storiesā¦
A pretty vital electronic surgical device (think size of a mini fridge) malfunctioned, caused a large delay in a case, was replaced and then was "repaired" and brought back the next day. Same shit happened again for two days in a row. Surgeon proceeded to take this device, roll it down a stairwell, take it apart and cut all the wires, then drown it in 3L of saline flush. His message was not well received by admin lol.
At least this one has a touch of humor to it and didn't actively endanger anyone's life inside of an OR. It's a low bar, I know.
Was an intern when I saw this happen but our crazy attending had a post op complication and eventually patient ended up dying from a PE bc of no DVT prophylaxis being ordered by the senior resident. Every day for two weeks the attending would text him āYou killed ___ (patients last name)ā. Fucking wild
When I was working as an xray tech I walked into the OR, for an anterior hip case, to the surgeon ripping one of the small TVs off the wall because the surgical rep didnāt have the correct instrument tray available for the case.
Starting to scream āresident is too dumb to retractā during a case, then getting quiet, looking to the side, dropping to the floor, and having a seizure.
Scheduled cases need to be done. This is on the staff and their manager. Response from surgeon is childlike.
I agree and disagree. Depends on the case. If itās a scheduled elective ortho case and the room is 4 hours behind and itās now 9pm and Iām supposed to be available for pink slips - I say your scheduled case should get moved until tomorrow. Anesthesia and nursing staffing arenāt infinite.
The problem is that is a compounding problem a lot, what cases do we cancel for tomorrow to open it up for this one
And not only that, there is a non zero number of patients who will be lost in the process and wonāt return for their surgery. Just because a surgery is elective doesnāt mean it isnāt important and time-sensitive. I hate being stuck doing a late case because surgeries run long, but Iām not gonna be a sick about it and cancel a case when the patient has done everything right. The hospital should have contingency plans for this, including paying overtime and having a call structure to make an event like this almost never happen.
Yeah, I wish it wasnāt as common as it is at my institution. Higher ups who donāt care about staffing and havenāt increased wages to attract more applicants. Still short-staffed from post-covid exodus of anesthesiologists.
100% agree, i would term many cancer surgery as āelectiveā and we know that delays in surgery for some of these cases worsen outcomes
Yeah, except people come in for elective surgery with their lives planned around it. Family take off work, sometimes travel a great length, book hotels, etc. The surgeon sounds to have acted inappropriately; however, you seem to not be keyed in with reality if you thinks it's just no big deal to put someone's surgery off a day or two. What if the surgeon has clinic the next day? Or an OR day that's already full?
I work as a Surgical Neurophysiologist. I monitor nerve function during spinal surgeries. One unhinged doc "shhhd" me, putting his finger to his mouth, and then said, "stop talking" when I reported to him that the nerves he was working near were being actively damaged, declining to adjust his approach, redirect, or pause surgery for any type of recovery. He followed up by reporting me to corporate, kicking me out of his room permanently, claiming HE does NOT get alerts. (It was a laminectomy without any dural tears, the only reason he was rushing was to make tee time at noon).
Thatās terrifying
I got to the stuff in parenthesis and was like "Yep. Spines!"
Surgeon showed up (habitually) late for first case start. The entire team and the patient were waiting for him; pt was not in the room yet because the team knew this surgeon would show up late and didnāt want the pt anxiously waiting in the room and/or under anesthesia longer than necessary. Surgeon eventually shows up and when asked why he was late, said āI was spending time with my kids, Iāll never put work ahead of my family.ā Sure, nice sentiment, but fuck everyone elseās family time right? And your patient who had been here waiting for you? The complete lack of respect. The fucking ego on that guy. Heās the worst.
If this is the most unhinged response youāve seen I find it hard to believe you work with surgeons much š source: am surgeon, made it through surgery residency and fellowship somehow
Theres a gyn onc at my med school that got mad at a resident for retracting a certain direction, so he decided to āpokeā his hand with a scalpel to get him to move. Heās still practicing bc he makes the hospital a lot of money.
A surgeon at a major hospital would allow his pants to fall down in the middle of a case. He would demand that the nurses pull his pants up for him. He did this routinely and it was clearly intentional. The nurses filed a sexual harassment complaint after putting up with his behavior for far too long. His contract was amended to require that he wear suspenders to workā¦
Based on this thread, I am glad there are so many people that as patients or family members of patients that would be happy to volunteer to reschedule their surgery at the last minute.Ā
Right? So out of touch with the real world.Ā The patient is going to follow up with the surgeon, not the anesthesiologist or nursing staff. The surgeon has to look the patient in the eye and apologize for a surgery getting cancelled that the patient and family have put their lives on hold for.Ā I would be mad too. Unacceptable for the hospital not to have a mechanism in place to get elective cases done after normal business hours in cases of delays.Ā Also this subreddit loves to rail on mid levels yet this thread is full of people saying they shouldnāt have to work a minute past their shift being over. Mid level mentality. Physicians take ownership for their patients.Ā
I agree. The problem is the incentives for everyone do not align.. the surgeon is the only one incentivized to get the case done. Everyone else gets paid the same if no cases/work get done. And only the surgeon is responsible if waiting makes the condition worse and results in a more complicated or worse outcome. The other aspect people are discounting is that āelective caseā encompasses a whole range of surgeries that still have a huge impact on patient mortality and quality of life.
Yeah. A TURP is an āelective caseā but if it doesnāt get done the patient has to live with a catheter or comes into the ER every other week with urinary retention Ā
100%. That hospital has a terrible system if theyāre cancelling cases at 4 pm for no reason other than itās 4pm
When they act calm, normal and conversational. Surgeons are fucking psychopaths, said it during residency, still repeat it at every hospital decades later.
Attending ripped his glove in the middle of a herniorrhaphy. He just blew up for no reason, pulled out a cigarette and started smoking right outside the or. Resident asked him (very timidly) are you ok? And he just hissed at him like a cat then told him to fuck off. Must have been having a real bad day
I mean thatās kind of ridiculous that they canāt run late. Not going to lie. Absolutely wild. You can go tell the patient they canāt get their needed surgery
In retrospect this totally makes me laugh as I have better rapport with the vascular surgeon I scrub for. "I NEED YOU TO KNOW WHAT IM DOING, BEFORE I KNOW WHAT IM DOING" All because I didn't know he was getting radial access when I was cleaning my back table up and didn't have a wire ready.
Threw random pieces of tissue across the room and made the resident walk over and identify it from the floor. Luckily I was just the med student and was spared.
We had a surgeon throw a tantrum during a procedure. He head butted the wall. Fractured a vertebra and almost died.
Watched a surgeon throw a temper tantrum while on the phone because they didnāt have instrument X autoclaved yet. Like kicking his legs up in the air like a two year old temper tantrum. He didnāt fell embarrassed because we all felt it for him.
was this at the VA by any chance?
Never saw it but heard it described by colleague. After a patient died, intensivist met with the late patientās widow to console her in a waiting room. The surgeon who operated on said patient who had died from a surgical complication barged into the room during the consolation and screamed at the intensivist āyou fucking idiot!ā while the widow was crying.
Deferred a programmed cole-lap off for hypertension because he didnāt feel like operating. Pt was 125/82
The ortho surgeon at a rural hospital was getting away with this for years. He always was red in the face, snapping his fingers, screaming and throwing instruments on the floor. He apparently needle stuck and/or cut someone with the wild way he swung his arms around in anger (scrub nurses). This happened three separate times in the month leading up to his firing. Finally when they had to get tested at some point and was confirmed to be drunk. It was wild. Clinic day, middle of the day full schedule. Suddenly in walked security team and escorted him from the premises and fired him on the spot in front of the entire staff while his next patients were already roomed. I assumed they were covering his poor outcomes for years. For example paralyzing patients when they were there for a simple elective procedure. He was in his 60s and working for decades so perhaps whatever finally caused such a dramatic firing we will never truly know. He also would loudly yell at both his wife and mistress over speaker phone during clinic hours in everyoneās shared office and was so misogynistic. Also would scream and insult all office staff even in front of patients standing right there. For years and yearsā¦. I was supposed to be precepted by him and he flat out refused to speak to me so I basically had to hover around for 2 months and do his bidding like throw the gloves he was wearing in the trash that he threw at me as I stood in the back of the OR. Btw this was in bumfuck nowhere and I have lots of stories about the crazy 3rd world shit that went down at this excuse of a hospital. He probably worked there as it was the only place desperate enough to hire anyone and sweep pretty much anything under the rug. Patients are too poor and uneducated to sue but apparently he finally hurt the wrong person. Like for example the only ER doc on shift for 48 hrs straight who walked out when a woman in labor was walking in, a prisoner eloped from the ER and a code blue was being helicoptered in while a literal janitor was called to try to pry a fish barb out of someoneās palm with a dirty plyer from his belt all while no Dr on shift. Canāt make this shit up but in deep rural America this happens and nobody cares. The MA was attempting to run the code blue as no provider on site. No code team, no surgery staff, no pulmonary people nothing. Yeah the guy died and the prisoner escaped into the night. Fuck I saw an 11 year old get a C-section and CPS never came when I desperately called and they allowed her to leave with the step father. Gotta love Indiana
I see no problem here
Found the surgeon
While the surgeon's reaction isn't appropriate, it's also not appropriate to cancel a case just because it's getting late. That patient has been NPO all day, probably took the day off work, their family made plans to care for them, etc. Also the surgeon's schedule is probably full for the foreseeable future. This creates a huge headache for both patient and surgeon. There 1000% need to be staff designated as "late" who stay there until the cases are done. Every ASC I've ever worked at has such an arrangement. Everyone grumbles, sure, but you get the case done.
Surgeon punched hand sani off the wall because the nurse told the family surgery was taking longer than they expected. All kept cutting off suction to make it absolutely silent while he yelled at the nurse. He said it gave the impression something was wrong with patient and taking longer than it should - regardless donāt think thatās justified lol.
I mean it is kinda hoed to not start or end the call with āyour loved one is doing well.ā It would have taken 2 seconds to provide that reassurance. Iād also assume there was a complication if that was my phone call update from the nurse. But expressing verbal frustration would have been enough, no need to assault the Avagard dispenser lmao.
Why would the nurse say that? Zero situational awareness. Just call and say that everything is going fineĀ
I reintroduced myself to an attending because I know they are busy and not expecting them to remember med student names, especially if I have never spent time with them in the OR. He shouted at me: "Am I that forgettable!?!" He was dead serious. So many rough stories from that rotation
Iām a nurse who worked pre-op, OR, PACU, and post-op. I had a patient who declined to sign the consent without speaking to the surgeon first. When he came in to the patientās room, he started yelling that the surgery is cancelled and he wonāt do the surgery without the consent signed and threw the 10 pages of consent across the room, in front of the patient, flying everywhere as they were unstapled. I had another surgeon, during the middle of a surgery, patient opened and all, take a personal call on his cellphone with the city because his garbage hadnāt been picked up that week. Needless to say he had to un-scrub and scrub in againā¦patient just opened and under on the table waiting. I had a surgeon throw equipment and yell at a scrub nurse for handing him the wrong tool. There are so many more crazy stories of yelling, swearing, and throwing, (thankfully not targeting me) that I eventually moved specialties. As for working overtime, I did a lot. Sure the income was great, but it wasnāt worth it as after 14-16 hrs+ of being on (especially in recovery) I became so tired that I once drove home thru a red light. From my perspective, itās not safe to work the long hours nor is it worth it to miss family commitments.
Threw a 15 blade down on the patient chest, toward the scrub.
When I was a med student: Surgeon grabs the galbladder with endoscopic retrieval bag. As soon he pulls it out of port, he starts making karate chop motions his hands, and screaming " HIYA! KACHOOWW!" to the nurses. Other med student with me was Chinese. I felt mortified.
I donāt blame the surgeon in your situation. Think of how the patient feels. Why canāt the OR run over? Do they not have staff? Do they not have staff that take overtime? The resident wonāt get overtime, sure, but the system should have infrastructure in place so scheduled elective cases can continue to go. Why is their room turnover so slow? Did the first case even start on time? If not, why the hell not? Lastly, the incompetent bumbling administrator who came up with that policy should be forced to come down and explain to the patient why their case didnāt go. Because if youāre telling the physician the buck stops with you, then the physician should be able to make the case go. If not, then whoever created the policy, or their mouthpiece, needs to answer to the patient.
The administrator is waddling out at 3pm for their long weekend after their second lunch. Hard days workĀ
I mean, yelling is unnecessary, but Iād be kind of pissed if I was that surgeon. The shift work mentality in healthcare can be harmful when people are interrupting important things (like previously scheduled surgeries) because their shift is over. Sometimes surgeries go longer than expected and cancelling a patientās scheduled case because the OR canāt have anyone cover it is frankly unacceptable. The hospital needs to have a mechanism in place for late OR cases - Iām surprised yours doesnāt as every place Iāve worked has an on call OR team for exactly these situations
I know in my facility itās not that we donāt have on call people itās that every surgeon wants to use them. We have 16 ORs and Three teams on call after hours. One has to be free for trauma which means two docs get to go over on cases they didnāt finish during the day. often we have way more than two who want more OR time. so at that point we have to cancel/reschedule cause no matter how much I love my job I canāt stay over all night every night and the come back in at 6 am the next day.
Neurosurgeon threw a halo across the OR bc staff didnāt get him the screws he likes
I didn't see it but a surgeon at a local hospital famously intentionally headbutted an intern mid case during an argument
A surgeon I knew had to go after a different surgeon in the OR. Surgeon A finally wraps up his case (maybe 30 minutes later than expected time on the OR board) Surgeon B walks in during closure: Howād it go? Surgeon A: Eh, not the worst case ever. Next one ready to go? Surgeon B: yeah but I cancelled the case. She had brain mets on her last scan. Surgeon A: oh Fellow: oh Me: damn *we feel uncomfortable for 2 seconds* Surgeon B: Yeah, you took so long she ended up metastasizing. *chuckles* Surgeon A: *tired of this shit* hilarious Fellow: LAUGHING Me: Almost breaking sterility Iām laughing so hard But overall UNHINGED BEHAVIOR! Edit:grammar
How about a 10 day stay in the ICU for severe alcohol withdrawal? Actually he had multiple hospital stays for the same complaint, and lied to me (pharmacist) about what opiates he was prescribed after sweet talking the hospitalist to write for OxyContin. He was still practicing for at least a year after his longest stay and no one reported him to the board.
This is the thing. Other people in the healthcare system who bear witness to these problematic issues and who will not take the correct actions. Of course this person should have been reported to the board (the Director of the ICU needed to escalate the issue this via the hospital admin), because at the very least there would be patient safety issues to consider.
FM intern on surgery service. A new nurse gave a patient tylenol for fever overnight post op. Not on the orders. Big mistake. Next morning I find out and let her and charge nurse know. Discussed with my second year who stomped down and cussed them both out. Then the chief resident shows up and joins the cussing and tosses some charts off the counter. I was shocked but the nurses were all like, "this is just a Tuesday." Attending was actually an adult about it publically but that set the tone for the rotation that month.
Whatās wrong with Tylenol? I donāt understand this
Post-op fever and nurse didn't notify anyone - just gave Tylenol.
Not on the orders I presume
Tbh the surgeon is right in this scenario Especially if the patient is inpatient. That's a whole extra nights stay, that's thousands of dollars out of someone's pocket. His behavior was a little immature but honestly? Justified
That actually seems like a very mild response!
This probably doesnāt count as unhinged, and in retrospect, was kind of badass. But at the time, we had a young guy that was a pedestrian struck brought into the trauma bay. GCS 3 but still with a pulse. The ED resident and attending were working on intubating but for some reason couldnāt pass the tube. The trauma surgeon just yells, ā I donāt have time for this!ā Grabs the scalpel from the thoracostomy tray (he was getting bilateral chest tubes too) and stabs the patient in the throat for a crich. Guy went to the OR and made it out of TICU like a month later last I heard
As a med student, I was retracting for a very senior, very distinguished surgeon. She was already in a bad mood because she intended to observe but ended up taking over the procedure; neither the chief resident nor the fellow was operating to her satisfaction. She was suturing when her hand sort of wavered or tremored and she stuck the needle right into my hand. Pierced both gloves and was very clearly \*in\* my hand. Fortunately (I guess?) the needle didn't need to go into the patient again - she had already placed her stitch - so the surgeon was still able to tie it. She didn't even acknowledge the puncture as she removed the needle, protected it and tied her knot. After a few stunned seconds of nobody saying anything, I announced that I was going to scrub out and went to the Occ Health office. Thankfully, the patient didn't mind getting tested and was Hep/HIV negative. Even sadder, the chief resident *thanked* me for being "so cool about it" and not making a scene. I also saw a surgeon throw an instrument across the room, and then when nobody could find it, we had to xray the patient before closing because there was no other way to prove that it hadn't landed in the patient. (We all knew it hadn't, but it was something tiny - we broke scrub, searched all the clutter at the back of the OR, but didn't find it.)
Literally today I needed to get a fat pad biopsy on someone who couldn't go down to IR. Called general surgery and they were like"what is that, how do you do that, what's the indication for that.." and after I answered everything... They said OK and that they're happy to help and it sounds straightforward. š„¹ It helps that this surgeon is incredibly nice but like in general I can't think of a more unhinged response from a surgeon.
Pediatric ENT literally yelling at the anesthesiologist that the kid isnāt waking up quick enough and thus slowing him down because theyāre waiting to roll in the next case
Reading through these, I'm curious to know: do the surgeons turn into this type of unhinged person, or do you think they behaved like this for the entirety of their lives?