My Day in Surgery

 A day in my life in surgery…

Most mornings I’m at the hospital 1-2 hours before our first case, rounding on my patients by myself, then meeting up with the surgery fellow to round on the rest and present the patients I saw. 

We go see our first patient in the pre-op area and change into scrubs. At this point I put on my scrub cap, surgical mask, and eye protection then go to the storage room to get all my gowns and gloves for the day. 

▪️Typically, you’ll get two pairs of gloves per case: the indicator (often colored gloves) will be first and those are 1/2 size bigger. Then you get another pair (often white) of your actual glove size. So for me, I grab a pair of size 7 green gloves and 6.5  of white.

I bring all that stuff into the OR before the case starts, introduce myself, and show them where I’m putting my stock of gloves and gowns.

▪️They will either have you “throw” them or just open them. If you don’t know what I’m talking about then just ask them. 

▪️Leave your badge on their keyboard so they can document your name. 

Once the patient gets into the room, I help get the patient situated.

▪️Good jobs to have are grabbing warm blankets, plugging in the SCDs, adjusting the table, shaving hair, and inserting foley catheters (ask to watch one first). 

When the fellow/resident goes to scrub, I follow them and we scrub together. When we get back into the OR, the scrub tech will hand you a sterile towel to dry off, open a gown then glove you. 

▪️To tie the gown, you’ll take the paper card, hand it to someone and spin 360 degrees to your left and tie it up. 

Now you’re ready for the fun stuff!

Ask your surgeon where they would like you to stand. They will tell you if they want you to hold anything, retract, feel something, etc. Often, you’ll be able to suture the incisions. The most common stitches I saw were interrupted and running subcuticular stitches. Throughout, they will point things out, explain why they do something, or ask you questions. You should be reading up on the cases the night before to prepare. At least know the medical/surgical history of the patient, indications for the surgery, and basic anatomy/blood supply to the area you’ll be operating on. 

At the end of the case, you’ll be able to help clean up, transfer the patient to the hospital bed, grab more warm blankets etc. Just find ways to be useful, and if you think you won’t be, get out of the way. You can follow the patient to post-op and make sure their vitals are stable and they are waking up ok. At this time, I go back to the lounge, grab a snack, run to the restroom and do it all again!

✤Courtney