Human Operations
I will not say when or where, because of confidentiality and all that (actually, it is all very confidential from my knowledge, too, since I don't even know who was operated on). But recently I was privileged to observe a human orthopedic surgeon at work.
This all started as a concept of my mentor Dr. R, who suggested that I find a human surgeon to observe. This, I agreed, was a great idea. The surgeries are a bit (or a lot) different, but the surgical principles cross over to dogs, cats and wombats.
It so happens that one of our clients is a human orthopedic surgeon, and he was amenable to me hanging out and learning. There are lots of people to whom you can give your number and never hope to hear from -- no matter how enthused they seemed at the time of information exchange. This surgeon, on the other hand, followed through, which is excellent.
I had never observed human surgery, never been surgicated on myself except the wisdom teeth extraction and lip laceration. I really didn't know how I would handle human blood... was imagining the young veterinarian fainting in the surgery room (that would have been funny). But, fabulously, they use tourniquets (which we do in small animals as well, for limb surgery) and the blood letting was negligible during the surgeries. And even when there was blood, it didn't bother me. So far, so good.
Today I took in the entirety of a total knee replacement and part of an ankle fracture. I was wowed by the computer-based tracking devices which they attached to the leg and used to assess the knee movement, varus/valgus, slope, etc. This is something I had not heard of before... way too pricey to use in animals, but nonetheless quite intriguing. I expect the technology is a little bit like that used to track human movements to use in animated videos.
The precision of the procedure and the sterility involved was impressive. This whole idea of replacing a joint and having the limb function normally is very cool. And yes, I did pick up on principles to carry over to the vet side.
It was sad to miss most of the fracture surgeries, but I had been playing hooky from my clinic long enough and had to return.
This all started as a concept of my mentor Dr. R, who suggested that I find a human surgeon to observe. This, I agreed, was a great idea. The surgeries are a bit (or a lot) different, but the surgical principles cross over to dogs, cats and wombats.
It so happens that one of our clients is a human orthopedic surgeon, and he was amenable to me hanging out and learning. There are lots of people to whom you can give your number and never hope to hear from -- no matter how enthused they seemed at the time of information exchange. This surgeon, on the other hand, followed through, which is excellent.
I had never observed human surgery, never been surgicated on myself except the wisdom teeth extraction and lip laceration. I really didn't know how I would handle human blood... was imagining the young veterinarian fainting in the surgery room (that would have been funny). But, fabulously, they use tourniquets (which we do in small animals as well, for limb surgery) and the blood letting was negligible during the surgeries. And even when there was blood, it didn't bother me. So far, so good.
Today I took in the entirety of a total knee replacement and part of an ankle fracture. I was wowed by the computer-based tracking devices which they attached to the leg and used to assess the knee movement, varus/valgus, slope, etc. This is something I had not heard of before... way too pricey to use in animals, but nonetheless quite intriguing. I expect the technology is a little bit like that used to track human movements to use in animated videos.
The precision of the procedure and the sterility involved was impressive. This whole idea of replacing a joint and having the limb function normally is very cool. And yes, I did pick up on principles to carry over to the vet side.
It was sad to miss most of the fracture surgeries, but I had been playing hooky from my clinic long enough and had to return.
posted by Claire at 19:33
3 Comments:
I wonder if this experience will help the young doctor to someday visit the orthopedist not as the observer, but as the observee...
Oh, wow, Claire! It is so neat that you got to do that; I am mildly jealous :-) I'm taking A&P I right now, and while I find it challenging to learn the vocabulary fast enough especially in the quarter system, it really is SO fascinating and fun. We are truly fearfully and wonderfully made!
JK, are you implying that I will break my leg?
Hannah, I would encourage you to investigate shadowing a surgeon sometime. And I imagine you will see a lot of surgery stuff in your nursing practicals. BTW, I missed you at the missions meeting -- the messages were very fitting for my life, striking cords in a number of places. Prayer, bitterness, depression, striving for excellency -- lots of great topics. I think I will try to listen to the tapes some time.
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