Too Experienced Surgeon Is Not Reliable

When choosing a surgeon for the operation, the experience was not a good yardstick in assessing reliability. Therefore, the most experienced surgeon is not necessarily the best surgeon. Age is one of the characteristics to be considered.

In studies in France, researchers analyzed data on thyroid surgery patients at high risk of complications if performed by surgeons who experience little or too much experience.

Handling by the surgeon safest provided by surgeons aged 35-50 years with experience for 50-20 years. Operations performed by this group were found to have the best results.

The findings suggest that surgeons can not maintain optimal performance only through years of experience. Researchers recommended that the hospitals monitor surgeons throughout his career, and providing retraining where necessary to minimize the possibility of error.

This study involves only surgeon in the field of endocrinology or hormone-producing glands. But it is unclear whether these findings also apply to doctors in other fields who perform various types of surgery.

The researchers examined the results of 3574 thyroidectomies operation, which is surgery to remove the thyroid gland of the patient's neck, which was conducted over a period of one year by 28 surgeons in 5 French hospitals. On average, the surgeons aged 41 years and have experienced for 10 years.

Patients were evaluated to see whether the two main complications of thyroid surgery is still there for six months after surgery. Complications were: severe hoarseness and hypoparathyroidism (a condition where the glands in the neck does not produce enough parathyroid), a hormone that helps control the levels of calcium in the body. Low calcium levels can cause twitching and cramps.

The result, complications that occur are very rare, only about 2 percent of all patients.

Compared surgeon with experience for 5-19 years, the surgeon who has experienced more than 20 years had a three times greater likelihood perform thyroid surgery that resulted in severe hoarseness, and seven times more likely to perform thyroid surgery resulting in hypoparathyroidism.

Surgeons whose experience is less than 5 years have a five times greater chance to do surgery that resulted in hypoparathyroidism than surgeons with 5-19 years experience.

In a research report published British Medical Journal, researchers found that many surgeons may experience decreased performance due to fatigue.

In addition, most experienced surgeons are often burdened with tasks that are more academic and administrative. This could affect the concentration of surgeons in the operating room and endanger patient safety. Failure to adopt new surgical techniques can also affect the performance of more experienced doctors.

The talent and experience alone are not sufficient to ensure safe operation if the surgeon does not have the motivation and willingness to go forward.