My Brother's/Sister's Keeper: Collective responsibility for the professional identity of surgeons

• Published in: The American journal of surgery Vol. 224; no. 1; pp. 282 - 283
• Main Authors: Johnson, Cali E., Smith, Brigitte K.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 01-07-2022; Elsevier Limited
• Subjects: Decision making; Identity formation; Medical education; Morbidity; Patients; Qualitative research; Skills; Surgeons; Surgery; Professional development; Professionalism; Professional identity; Surgical education
• ISSN: 0002-9610; 1879-1883
• DOI: 10.1016/j.amjsurg.2022.03.001

Themes are identified within a rich dataset through an iterative process of coding and recoding the experiences of participants.2 In this way, the research team was able to look beyond pre-conceived notions about the topic at hand, high-risk surgical decision-making, and give voice to unexpected concepts that exist in the data, identifying four elements that influence professional identity formation among practicing surgeons: individual factors, interpersonal relationships, external influences, and professional experience. The authors urge us to: 1) keep our actions patient-centered, 2) recognize the responsibility and burden of surgical decision making and build practices to promote surgeon wellbeing, 3) emphasize the intimate nature of invasive interventions and be open with vulnerability and loss that are inevitable byproducts of those who bravely take action, and 4) build resiliency skills for both teachers and learners.1 These discrete principles can be immediately incorporated as core values during weekly conferences, morbidity and mortality discussions, and grand rounds, as well as during clinical patient care encounters. [...]when seeking to improve his own surgical skills through coaching, Dr. Atul Guwande reflected that society expects that surgeons do not need help and should not admit vulnerability.6 Since that time, professional coaching has gained increasing popularity, with one recent study of practicing surgeons suggesting that coaching interactions provide a “free space where surgeons can relax a deeply entrenched identity to push the boundaries of current surgical culture and engage with a more open and inclusive identity.”