Surgery Field Preferences: Procedure or Disease Based?

[islandinthesun]

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I don't think I've ever seen this topic broached so I have a question. I know that I want to go into surgery, that is not the question. I always thought though that I wanted to eventually be a CTS, due to personal experiences with family/friends who had cardiac diseases.

*Take next section with grain of salt because I know I have been exposed to only 1% of each field*

During school however, I thought that the actual variety and types of operations in vascular were much more interesting than the ones by CT. Amps, AAA, AV fistulas...it just seemed like these guys wouldn't get bored by doing the same thing over and over...The CABG/valves however seemed like it'd become much more monotonous much sooner.

As a student I'm sure many of you are saying "its too soon to worry about fellowships" which is true, but due to the fact that there are integrated programs for both fields, I feel as though I do need to make a decision now. If i don't get in, then I will go GS and worry about this in 3-4 years, but for now my dilemma is: disease vs procedure?

Any insight on which seems to be the stronger choice?

 

[ChiSoxMD]

It is obviously a bit of both, however, if you had to pick one, I would definitely say choose based on the disease. Procedures change drastically and will continue to as the technology changes. If you went into vascular 10 or 15 years ago because you LOVED open aortas, carotids, and bypasses, while you would still be doing them today, you would be doing WAY more endovascular.

Bottom line, you have to like the procedures, but the technology will change the specifics of the procedure. If instead focus on what disease processes you like, and which ones you like to fix, then even when the procedures change, you will still be happy.

 

[thedrjojo]

Just look at how robotic and laparoscopic has changed things... we had a grand rounds last week about Minimally Invasive Esophagectomies.... Lecturer from UPitt showing videos of total laparoscopic and thorascopic Ivor-Lewis! absolutely insane. Tech will advance and change, so I think you have to enjoy the disease processes. That being said, Cardiac and Vascular are similar disease processes. If you are looking at the combined programs, many more vascular slots exist than do cardiac slots, but they are still both highly competitive.