A neurosurgery case that this medical student won’t forget

After the last elective case of the day, the neurosurgeon I was shadowing told me that he was on overnight call that evening, and that I could stick around to observe more surgeries if I wanted to. “Yes,” I responded. “Absolutely yes.” My fascination with surgery stems from its ability to provide immediate results to a patient by cutting out, repairing, reshaping, or bypassing the problem. It’s exciting and tactile, and I find that very appealing. What’s more thrilling is emergency surgery, when an operation becomes the last-ditch intervention that hopefully saves someone from imminent death. The first case of the night was the draining of a brain abscess in a 60-year-old man, followed by the evacuation of a symptomatic subdural hematoma in an elderly lady. As the surgeon was closing the scalp incision on the second case, the OR phone rang. It was the emergency department, asking to speak to the neurosurgeon immediately. The nurse put the phone on loudspeaker, and the surgeon took the call. We were informed of a patient being transferred to us from a small regional hospital, needing urgent neurosurgical intervention. The patient, whom I’ll call Ms. H, was a 50-year-old woman who presented with a sudden severe headache, nausea, and vomiting. Brain imaging revealed a subarachnoid hemorrhage from a ruptured internal carotid artery aneurysm, with signs of elevated intracranial pressure. An aneurysm (the abnormal out-pouching of a blood vessel wall) that ruptures in ...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - Category: Journals (General) Authors: Tags: Education Medical school Surgery Source Type: blogs