17 Secrets Surgeons Pray You Never Find Out

1.Although "best doctors lists" are a good starting point, don't forget to ask hospital employees about a doc you may be sizing up. Their opinions are pretty accurate.  2. Ask you doc about his or her complication rate. If they don't have one, they're hiding something or haven't operated enough to have one. Keep in mind no one is immune to complications. 3. Make sure your surgeon is board certified at www.absurgery.org If your facing a stiff jail sentence and a jury trial, you would want to make sure that your criminal lawyer  was a certified trial attorney. So don't even think about using a surgeon who is not board certified in his field.
4. Always get a second or third opinion since some surgeons won't mention procedures they don't know how to do. Also your primary doctor's referral to a surgeon  may not always be the best .  5. Always ask your surgeon who is going to take care of you after surgery. You want to make sure that your surgeon or his assistants will see you on a regular basis until you have fully recovered. 6. Always have elective surgery early in the week since lots of doctors  go away for the weekend and won't be around to make sure your ok. 7. Make sure you find out who your anesthesiologist will be since he is just as important as your surgeon. Check him out thoroughly. 8. Make sure your surgeon doesn't rely just on one pathologist. Ask him to send all your slides to a nationally recognized reference lab to get a second pathology opinion. 9. Always ask your surgeon what risk about the procedure worries him the most. 10. All surgeon residents have to learn how to operate one time or another, but just make sure it's not at the risk of your health.  Verify that your surgeon will be actively involved in your surgery and not just checking in every hour. 11. Ask your surgeon how many of these operations has he done. The average number of surgeries a  surgeon does during a residency  is about  900.Also ask  your doctor if the surgery is truly necessary , whether you can wait a while, and ask about non-surgical options.  That's because they get paid 10 times more money to operate on you that to manage your illness conservatively. 12. If you have unanswered questions about your surgery after the operation,  ask to read the operative note report dictated by the surgeon . 13 If you have pain in your calf after surgery, or if swells up and looks red, you may have a blood clot which is a risk of every surgery. 14.You should know that 25% of all operations are unnecessary. That's because private hospital administrators push doctors to do more procedures to generate more income. After all, hospitals don't run those expensive TV commercials with celebrity spokes people for their health.    15. The average income of a U.S. surgeon is $265,000.  Some surgeons hire practice management consulltants to generate more revenue. They many want the doctor to build a surgery center to capture facility fees or get an in-office MRI machine. Also, some orthopedic surgeons make millions in soft consulting agreements with device manufacturers. So if you need a medical implant device, ask your doctor if he has a financial relationship with the vendor. If so, you may end up with a device that is more expensive or not the most appropriate. 16. If your doctor wants to give you a stent always ask him if it's better than medicine. If you're not having a heart attack or unstable angina, studies show that you will do equally well with a stent or medicine. Also keep in mind that having something permanently implanted in your body is not a risk free proposition. In addition, there is evidence that thousands of people have had stents implanted that they did not need. 17. If you have any kind of serious medical condition, always go to a university teaching hospital. You'll get doctors involved in the latest medicine and you'll have the advantage of having a resident or physician beside 24-7 and a surgeon will always be on call.