An interesting point that this thread brushed on but missed that I think needs to be discussed locally and nationally is the rise of the nurse. As a surgeon, son of a nurse turned internist and husband of a nurse I have observed some interesting things. The education of nursing has changed recently and the mindset is different. During my wife's commencement ceremony I listened to the Dean of nursing say "[... Providing as good and usually better care than the doctors who they work with...]". (Yes I ended with a preposition on purpose). She thinks this is nonsense but many of her classmates aspire to the new Doctor or Nursing degree because they feel they be equal and likely "better". They are trained to question. I have had many evening discussions with my wife about nursing and physician relations and one time she reminded me that a nurse who carries out a physician order exactly as written that ends up causing harm puts HER license on the line. Nurses lose their license much easier than physicians lose lawsuits and certainly easier than losing a medical license.
Of course every employee in the OR has an integral role. We had a sewer clog under our OR and it backed up. For that week, nobody was more important than the "sanitation engineers" trying to fix it, not even the surgeons. Everyone deserves respect.
Screw lawsuits, let's talk about who has to speak to the family after an event and who has to lose countless hours of sleep and who has to manage the complications assuming the event didn't cause death. Nobody else in the room. Everyone else is home drinking Busch Light.
I would venture to say that surgeons who treat people poorly are either: 1) stressed (most common I imagine and affects all of us from time to time, or 2) unhappy or depressed, or 3) a jerk. Probably similar to every professional field, medical or not.
Now, let's be clear, in reference to your first post: the surgeon is paying your salary- no surgeon, no patient, no hospital, no job, no career.
