Shadowing a surgeon

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JoshuaGuit

JoshuaGuit

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I called the office of a surgeon to ask if there was any possibility of me shadowing him. The receptionist asked if I were in medical school and after I told her no, she told me to call back on Tuesday to talk with the medical scheduler.

I was a patient of this surgeon 3 years ago and although the hospital he practices at is about an hour away, I am really interested in shadowing him in the OR for a day or two to watch similar surgeries (colorectal).

I realize that shadowing a surgeon is somewhat rare as an undergrad.

Does anyone have advice on how to convince the medical scheduler or the doctor? Do I even have a shot?
 
depending on the place, there might be policies in place where you're just not allowed in the OR, so no convincing is going to work. It just is very institution specific. if you just want to watch it and have no other interest, have you tried a search on youtube?
 
The hospital is actually a pretty large teaching hospital if that means anything

I'm really interested in becoming a GI physician which is why I thought it would be a good idea to shadow him. I've watched some of the surgeries on ORLive, but thought a real life experience would have more of an influence on me.
 
it really depends on the place. Probably smaller community hospitals are a little more flexible. I am in a major university hospital on the East Coast and no outsiders are allowed in the OR. Also, it's true that there is nothing like being in the OR. HOwever, depending on many factors you might not have a good view of the operating field. HEck, sometimes even as a med student you don't get to see anything...good luck!
 
I just got accepted to shadow a cardiothoracic surgeon for two weeks.

I wont be in the ER, but he has a head camera hooked up to two HD tv's I can watch for and will be allowed to dissect a few pigs in the hospital's laboratory.

Call, and see what they can do for you. Some doc's are very accepting to letting undergrads shadow. 🙂
 
I just emailed a surgeon about shadowing, and he responded almost immediately. He said just come in and I could watch him in the OR for a couple of days. Going to be an exciting week next week! 😀
 
Off-topic, but where do you people find emails of doctors? I've searched hospital websites and can only find phone #'s.
 
getright said:
Off-topic, but where do you people find emails of doctors? I've searched hospital websites and can only find phone #'s.
Click to expand...

I found them by guess & check. [email protected], etc. I would quickly get an error message back if the address did not exist. None of the doctors had a series of numbers or nicknames in their work email address. I usually found the email address within a minute.

This approach worked for me. I found email of doctors that came to talk at school pre-med meetings (even better to ask in person if you can) or involved in education in some other way. These were the doctors that answered my emails and allowed me to shadow.
 
getright said:
Off-topic, but where do you people find emails of doctors? I've searched hospital websites and can only find phone #'s.
Click to expand...

I just looked up local doctors around my area, especially the ones that are around the Medical schools in my area. Google is your best friend. I've searched a long time until I got a good list with over 100 doctor's email. Going to shadow 5-10 doctor's per summer now. XD

The DO site didn't work for me. They (the 8 DO's in my area) never responded.
 
Xcellerator said:
I just looked up local doctors around my area, especially the ones that are around the Medical schools in my area. Google is your best friend. I've searched a long time until I got a good list with over 100 doctor's email. Going to shadow 5-10 doctor's per summer now. XD

The DO site didn't work for me. They (the 8 DO's in my area) never responded.
Click to expand...

I saw that in the other DO shadowing thread... That sucks...

I got emails back from 5 of the 8 doctors I emailed. It looks like it depends entirely where you live.

The only ones who neglected to email me back were hema/onc doctors... Guess that specialty is reserved for only meanies. :laugh:
 
Well I finally started shadowing a surgeon (General) today. It was only for a couple of hours in the clinic, but it was a great experience! Tomorrow I get to go in the OR and see two Gallbladder cases (Cholecystectomy), an inguinal hernia, and a colon resection! I'm sooo totally excited for this!

The doctor even insisted on giving me these surgery textbooks. One of them was this HUGE "Textbook of Surgery 17th Ed." by Sabiston and the other one was an older 1991 "Laproscopic Surgery" by Karl Zucker. I don't even know the doctor at all and only randomly found his contact info in a directory. I think I was very lucky! 😀

KTownGT said:
I saw that in the other DO shadowing thread... That sucks...

I got emails back from 5 of the 8 doctors I emailed. It looks like it depends entirely where you live.

The only ones who neglected to email me back were hema/onc doctors... Guess that specialty is reserved for only meanies. :laugh:
Click to expand...

Wow, that's great. And yeah, I guess the DO's in my are are busy/meanies too? Haha, j/k. But I'm ok with just shadowing MD's.
 
OR shadowing experiences can be pretty interesting depending on which doc you end up with - I'd say if you're still having trouble getting ahold of one try volunteering at a local hospital and doing some networking. Do you need to shadow 10 docs/summer? Hell no - I'm actually wondering who has that kind of time in college. Is most of SDN unemployed?
 
Can you volunteer time at the surgeon's outpatient office? Also sometimes if you are not standing next to the surgeon you can atleast go into the OR and observe. Meeting the surgeon in person would help. If not, watch surgeries online! If not, shadow in the ER and then work your way to the OR!
 
You might have better luck shadowing at a private institution so if you have any connections in the private sector, that might be your best bet initially. Shadowing at a academic institution usually means more red tape and competition with med students on rotations so unless you have good connections, I would start asking the private institutions in addition to the guy you know right now just to cover your basis. Good luck!
 
My best advice is persistence. At the University hospital at my undergrad school, and now med school 😀 i got online and looked up doctors i wanted to shadow. I wanted to shadow CT surgery, so i called their office, and they talked to the surgeons. their office called me back a couple of days later and told me to come in. I went in on one of the morning they had their weekly conference/m&m with the current resident. After that i just talked with them and asked if it was okay if i shadowed in the OR, I shadowed them for almost two years once or twice a week, One day in the OR and one day conference/clinic. Shadowing at my local hospital was a little harder and took more effort. as with most smaller hospitals most of the doctors are independent of the hospital, kinda. so i called the hospital to get connected with the general surgery offices. after i got a hold of them i once again talked with their office staff. they put me in touch with a doctor that was cool with me shadowing him and I just met him at the hospital and did the required paper worked they needed for me to be in the OR. Most of the time they require you to have a badge of identification. also if they let you shadow they will make the arrangements for you to get the proper badges and identification. But like others have said it depends on the Doctor and the staff if you can go in the OR. One doctor i know won't let anyone by med students shadow her, while others just don't let anyone shadow them in any sense.
 
I've spent several days back in the OR hanging out with a plastic surgeon and watching him do his thing. This was a pretty decent sized hospital too, they didn't ask me to do anything. They just wanted my name so they could document me as a visitor as per regulations. Great experience. I've noticed surgeons love to show off.

(Of course the surgeon knew I was also volunteering there, but no one in the OR knew any of that.)
 
Haha, that's exactly the same with me, familyaerospace. The General Surgeon that I was shadowing did his thing in decent sized hospital. No one asked for any TB tests or documents, only my name for visitor purposes. Awesome experience here as well. And yeah, surgeons do love to show off. 😀 I haven't done any hospital volunteering, though. :/

And I just got done shadowing a Radiologist, sooo much different from Surgeons lol!
 
Neurologists are also really different. Almost the exact opposite, but also fun in a completely different way. Their sense of humour could not be more opposite. 🙂

Although I'm unlikely to be a surgeon, I will never forget my time in that OR!
 
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