Inpatient/Outpatient US Clinical Experience in General Surgery in Houston

Information about this clinical experience:

You will be under the supervision of a board-certified general surgeon who is a dedicated teacher. Every year, the general surgery residency program at McGovern Medical School at UT Health Science Center sends a resident to rotate with this attending for a period of two months. This attending also teaches and mentors premedical students and PA students.

Although this attending has multiple hospital staff appointments, 90% of the work is performed at a single hospital in Victoria, Texas. This hospital serves not only the patient population of Victoria but serves as a catchment area for the approximately 200,000 patients spread throughout the region surrounding the city, an area that has limited access to surgical care.

Rotators will have the opportunity to spend time in the outpatient clinic, operating room, and on call with the attending. Typical OR cases include laparoscopic cholecystectomy, hernia repair (inguinal, incisional, umbilical), breast biopsy and other procedures, thyroid surgery, and colon resection. Every Wednesday, the doctor is on call. What this means is that the attending is available for emergency cases (e.g., cholecystectomy, colon perforation). While on call, new patient consultations will also be performed, a wonderful opportunity for the rotator to learn how to perform an evaluation of urgent surgical issues. The surgeon is also on call for acute care and trauma cases.

During your experience, you will learn the following U.S. medical practices under the preceptor’s supervision:

• Taking patient histories.

• Performing physical exams under the physician's supervision.

• Presenting patients.

• Accessing the EMR to review the patient chart (Meditech Expanse)

• Researching the literature to answer clinical questions at the point of care.

• Spending time with other healthcare professionals to understand their roles and responsibilities.

• Observing a variety of surgeries in the operating room (rotators will be permitted to scrub in).