"Is your surgeon double booked?" - Washington Post article

besa

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-sci...

From 07/10/2017 Washington Post - Health and Science Section, article by Sandra G. Boodman

"The controversial practice has been standard in many teaching hospitals for decades, its safety and ethics largely unquestioned and its existence unknown to those most affected: people undergoing surgery.

But over the past two years, the issue of overlapping surgery — in which a doctor operates on two patients in different rooms during the same time period — has ignited an impassioned debate in the medical community, attracted scrutiny by the powerful U.S. Senate Finance committee that oversees Medicare and Medicaid, and prompted some hospitals, including the University of Virginia's, to circumscribe the practice."

MarilynIllinois

I read this article too. This concerns me. What to do? Read the surgery consent forms ahead of time? Discuss with surgeon?

I don't want my surgeon to leave the operating room!

besa

It's a reasonable concern and we should be able to discuss it. If the surgeon is not accommodating voting with my feet works for me. I also think it is reasonable, after discussing this with the surgeon, to note the request on consent forms.

Lumpie

I could not disagree more with any suggestion (by some cited in the article) that this could possibly be a "gray area." When I give consent to a surgery, I give consent to it being done by a particular surgeon subject to the representation that the surgeon will 1) actually be present for the entire procedure and 2) actually execute the procedure. Any practice deliberately undertaken in contravention of such an agreement is a) fraud and b) assault and battery. There is nothing ambiguous about it.

Because I feared, but did not expect, that a surgeon unknown to me might preform part of my surgeries, I very specifically inquired before my surgeries about exactly who would be present in the room and whether the surgeon would preform the entire procedure. I was told who would be present and was assured that my surgeon would preform the entire procedure. You can't be too careful. After significant complications following one of my surgeries, I made inquiries afterward, too. I was assured that the surgeon performed the entire procedure and that no complications were evident on the day of surgery. The operative report was nothing but routine. I wonder if the practices described in the article are clearly documented in operative reports? Practices like the ones described in the article undermine patient trust in their care providers and should never be permitted by reputable hospitals or surgical centers.