Name: So You Want to Be a SURGEON [Ep. 2]
Uploaded: 2020-04-26T19:26:21.000Z
Duration: 12 min 49 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

So you want to become a surgeon. You've come to the right place.

In this new series, we'll cover various specialties and types of doctors and help you decide which type of

doctor, surgeon or other healthcare professional would be the best fit for you.

Welcome to our second installment of the So You Want to Be series. You can find the entire list on our

In this series, we highlight a specific specialty or type of professional within healthcare,

explaining not only what it means to be that type of provider, but also how to become one.

If you want to help us decide which specialty or healthcare professional to cover next,

drop a comment down below with your request.

If you like to see what it's like to be a surgeon check out my second channel Kevin Jubbal, M.D.

where I do another series in parallel titled A Day In the Life.

So far we've followed orthopedic surgeons, hospitalists, a pulmonary critical care doctor, and more.

There are several stereotypes of surgeons, one of them being that they love history.

The history of surgery is a fascinating story, and my medical school actually provided us with a copy of

An Anatomy of Addiction to read prior to starting our first year.

It's one of my favorite medical books, covering Dr. William Halsted and the birth of modern surgery,

and if you're interested in any surgical specialty, definitely check it out.

Until the 19th century, surgeons were trained simply by apprenticeships.

There weren't formal residency programs as there are today.

usually lasting anywhere from 5 to 7 years and starting around the age of 12 or 13.

That's right, imagine a tweenie cutting you open and be then grateful that you live in the 21st century.

In the 1890s, Dr. William Osler of Johns Hopkins introduced the concept of clinical clerkships

and bedside rounds to teach his medical students, which are now the norm today.

In the early 1900s, Dr. William Halsted moved to Baltimore and was appointed the first chief of

the department of surgery at Johns Hopkins.

The modern practice and training of surgery can be largely attributed to the anal-retentive,

cocaine-addicted, and incredibly badass Dr. Halsted.

He not only created the first formal surgical residency program in the U.S. at Johns Hopkins,

but also pioneered many other aspects of modern surgery that we take for granted today.

His advances resulted in new techniques and instruments to

reduce damage to tissues and blood vessels, such as different types of forceps, suture, and ligatures.

He was also the first to introduce rubber gloves to the operating room

and was the father of modern sanitization in surgery.

We call many of his lasting impressions Halsted's Principles,

including modern techniques for hemostasis  - meaning the controlling of bleeding,

accurate anatomical dissection, complete sterility, and gentle handling of tissues.

If you've ever had surgery, or even a small procedure using local anesthetic,

you can thank Dr. Halsted for it not being a barbaric mess.

There's a wide spectrum of surgical subspecialties, and it isn't fully agreed upon what

being a surgeon entails. Let's start with the most traditional forms of surgery.

The core is of course General Surgery, originally being the broadest category of surgery.

However, over the decades, it has mostly been relegated to procedures of the

gastrointestinal, meaning digestive, and endocrine systems.

In medical school and residency, we joke that general surgeons are the true masochists,

as their lifestyle is nothing to be envious of,

they don't make as high of salaries as other specialties,

and they handle some of the less desirable and odorous pathologies dealing

with abdominal contents and fecal matter.

But in all seriousness, it's a pretty awesome specialty and I know some great general surgeons,

like Dr. David Hindin who provided me some insights about general surgery when making this video.

General Surgery residency is five years, after which you can specialize further.

Colorectal surgery is a one-year fellowship,

dealing with pathologies such as colon cancer or inflammatory bowel disease.

Minimally invasive surgery is also a one-year fellowship,

and focuses on techniques like laparoscopic surgery that are less invasive than

the traditional open abdominal procedures.

Transplant surgery is one to two years, and focuses on kidney and liver transplants most commonly,

but also pancreas transplants and access procedures such as

dialysis fistulas and peritoneal dialysis catheters.

Surgical critical care is one year, focusing on patients who are more medically unstable

and requiring acute surgical interventions.

Pediatric surgery is one to two years, obviously focusing on surgery in babies and children.

Vascular surgery is also a one to two year fellowship, dealing with procedures of the aorta,

carotid arteries, varicose veins, dialysis access, or other procedures dealing with arteries and veins.

Surgical oncology is one year, dealing with cancer pathologies,

meaning the resection, or removal, of the tumor.

Breast surgery is one year, focusing on breast cancer and other breast pathologies.

Surgical oncologists and breast surgeons remove the tumor but they don't cover the defect themselves.

They turn to plastic surgeons for complex coverage and reconstruction.

Plastic surgery is moving toward an integrated residency,

meaning six years of dedicated plastic surgery training after medical school.

However, there are some more traditional independent pathways,

meaning three years of plastic surgery fellowship after completing five years of general surgery.

Cardiothoracic surgery is two to three years, focusing on surgery of the heart and thoracic cavity,

although there is also a six-year integrated pathway, similar to the plastic surgery route.

Hand surgery is a one-year fellowship, although only a few percent of practicing hand surgeons

Over 95% of hand surgeons have completed an orthopedic surgery or plastic surgery residency first,

This was the path I was intending to take after completing my plastic surgery residency,

There are other fields that perform surgical procedures, but some surgeons wouldn't call it

OB-GYN doctors perform procedures like Cesarean sections,

which is less refined, way more crude, and far less complex than regular surgery.

That being said, OB-GYN doctors also do hysterectomies,

meaning surgical removal of the uterus, and other gynecology oncology resections that

The other surgical specialty that isn't really surgery is Ophthalmology.

We generally consider ophtho to be more of a procedural specialty than a surgical subspecialty.

Entering medical school, surgery really wasn't on my radar.

I was enamored with the idea of being a gastroenterologist and helping pediatric patients

that have inflammatory bowel disease and other similar pathologies.

I've always known that I wanted to work with my hands,