Please wait...

Category: August 2018

This issue, we asked members if there was anything special about their OR. While we found that unique preparation and music styles were definitely key in making operating rooms special, one resounding notion rang true: it’s the people in the OR that truly make it what it is.

Patient Safety Scenario #5: Communication

This essay is the fifth installment of the monthly Patient Safety essays, produced by the Patient Safety Subcommittee of the Ethics and Professionalism Committee. The essays are written in the spirit of the aviation industry’s “Black Box Thinking” in order to inform and improve our medical safety record. To read earlier essays and learn how to […]

Read more

Wound Closure And Logic

By George W. Balfour, MD My suggested topic for this new ASSH activity was “What is special about my OR?  How do I like the music?” Being a senior (very) member and being very hard of hearing I have to respond: What is music? I am entertained by the number of mundane issues in every day […]

Read more

When Patients Choose The Playlist

By O. Alton Barron, MD My operating room may be unique in that we always play music and the patient gets to choose the playlist if they want. There is something positive about the patient’s individual imprint on the process. But for me, that process begins with the initial office conversation.  I learn as much […]

Read more

Worth Its Weight

By Gregory D. Byrd, MD Our operating room is a model of efficiency. I am constantly amazed by how much can be accomplished in the normal hours from 7am to 3pm. This is largely because of a very strong and consistent team. I normally have two rooms and have had the same scrub technician (Igor) since […]

Read more

Anatomy In Surgery: Learning And Teaching Through Drawings

By Emmanuel P. Estrella, MD, MSc As a hand surgeon, I am involved in a university-based hospital–University of the Philippines-Philippine General Hospital–where encounters with medical students and orthopedic surgery residents is a daily routine. We try to create an atmosphere in the operating room where learning is for everyone, both surgeons and students alike. As […]

Read more

Teamwork And Attitude

By Lorenzo Garagnani, MD, FRCS, EBHS Dip Hand Surg I practice as a Consultant hand and wrist surgeon at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust in London (UK). Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospitals are busy central London teaching hospitals and a tertiary referral centre. The team regularly working with me in the OR includes a senior Hand […]

Read more

Match The Hatch

By Carlos O. Gargollo, MD I was fortunate enough to spend my fellowship training under the guidance of James B. Bennett MD, in Houston, TX. He not only taught me the fine points of Hand Surgery, but also his passion for Fly fishing, and in all these years I have found many striking similarities between […]

Read more

An Atmosphere Of Comfort

By Glen Jacob, MD The people are the main reason why my operating room is special. The atmosphere generated by those that work there is simply one of comfort, which only promotes an environment conducive to trying to help make patients better. Many patients comment on their experience, and often site that I am fortunate to […]

Read more

A Novel Approach For Failed Surgery

By William Edward Sanders, MD INTRODUCTION: My “niche” in practice was chronic upper extremity pain and failed surgery. In our community, there was one surgeon who had complications from LRTI basilar joint arthroplasty. I re-operated on 6 of these patients where the CMC joint was adducted and contracted with minimal motion. Many variations of the LRTI […]

Read more

OR And Martial Arts, “Budo”

By Takuro Wada, MD I left the University Hospital after four years and become a president of the affiliated hospital. I am occupied by business meetings inside and outside of the hospital. I need to care about clinical outcomes and financial performance not only of hand surgery and orthopaedics, but also the whole hospital — as […]

Read more