Medicine isn ’t a competition. It’s a team sport.

I love sports analogies. There is so much in competition and team play that mirrors the way departments work in many sectors of medicine. “There is no ‘I’ in ‘team,'” as the adage says. Michael Jordan, for example, did not win his championships in the NBA until he had fairly decent and dependable team of support around him. The stars in many sports cannot achieve the greatest height of success without the team dynamic. Medicine is no different. Physicians in the hierarchy of medicine are often considered the clinical “team leaders.” Yes, there has been an onslaught on physician autonomy. Yes, there is a lot more administrative bureaucracy that many physicians answer to which is infringing on the autonomy and leadership of doctors. However, in the big scheme of our clinical work we are still at the helm — but precarious our positioning is. The clinical decision making and fall out from clinical concerns still largely rests on our shoulders. Some time ago, I found myself working closely with my team on a lumbar puncture. As we prepped our patient and secured the position, successfully extracting CSF our team comprised of nursing staff, residents, and myself as the attending celebrated our first attempt success. A champagne tap never gets old. There is a saying in this situation: “If the LP is a success, the physician doing the LP was good. If the LP fails, the support staff or holder failed”. That saying has been circulating for decades, ...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Physician Hospital-Based Medicine Source Type: blogs