Should a Brain Surgeon be up at night with a baby doing night feeds ?

@WhenICalledYouLastNightFromTesco - the op was about sleep deprivation and responsibility as was my response. I saw no mention of whether or not you would wish to have a sleep deprived surgeon in yours

Yes, if the woman is on maternity leave anyway. She can nap when the baby naps and decide to stay home or use public transport rather than driving if too tired.
The surgeon could obviously help during night feeds when off work the next day, but if the situation is the surgeon is a single parent then realistically they should be asking for a different role until the baby is sleeping more rather than risking people's lives by operating whilst sleep deprived.

I never dissed nurses, the post is about brain surgeon's who might lack sleep - I wouldn't want one.

I don't know many surgeons that operate 7 days a week so there would definitely be some nights that they are not doing brain surgery the next day.

Well when dh was doing his residencies many years ago it was perfectly usual for all of the doctors - including the surgeons - to do call and be have more disrupted sleep than that.

@WhenICalledYouLastNightFromTesco agreed. As that newly minted band 5 bedside nurse who isn’t‘ ‘really ’ the same thing as a brain surgeon will be responsible for timely administration of drugs, infection control and recognising and responding to the deterioration of a dozen or so patients, single handedly and as often as not with a break snatched while writing notes. Not for her the highly skilled doctor who is a consultant anaesthetist to her left and competent Registrars and SEOs to her right, who will be alert and responsive to the merest millilitre of an inappropriate scalpel flicker and likely be wielding the frill themselves, as part of the team.
No, that nurse who is not, as you so rightly point out, not REALLY the same as your brain surgeon will be doing this solo, without a highly skilled team around her, without the non facing patient time to regroup and without the responsibility for only one individual at a time.
And just how well that consultant’s patient recovers after the operation, well just think whom that is down to- yep you guessed it that Band 5 nurse, whom you say will be sacked if she makes a serious mistake

And just to reiterate for context. Sleep deprivation is a recognised method of torture of which the most extreme method is intermittent deprivation. So wake up, bit of sleep, wake up, sleep not into REM, wake up, repeat, is recognised as torture. Unless it's your baby who can mitigate you being tortured with a 😃

No, but they should be extremely grateful to their partner for picking up the slack and should be making sure they get adequate time to rest outside of their working hours. The brain surgeon chose to have a child and it's their responsibility to work with their partner to find an acceptable way to fulfil their parental duties and be safe at work.

Brain surgeons, lorry drivers, pilots should get a proper nights sleep before working. However they can do maximum night wakes going into days off, giving SAHP the respite they need.

Also staggering baby duty might meet everyone’s needs day to day dsy. Brain surgeon does any wakes between 8pm and 1am while SAHP sleeps. SAHP does any wakes between 1am and 7am while Brain surgeon sleeps

Surely though if you are a surgeon you could afford to outsource? I'd get a nanny to come on the mornings so I could have a sleep in

I think there are numerous jobs where sleep deprivation can have public health significance if it affects judgement. I would also suggest there are people not making optimum decision because of sleep deprivation everyday, but masking it to ensure they continue to work because of financial reasons or to ensure their career is not compromised.
This thread has opened a really thought provoking debate.
And the PP who said what about sleep deprivation and then looking after small children as a parent on your own. What support is there their?

Surgeons and parenting don’t go well with each other sadly

This. I did all the night feeds and my DH works in the office. Being sleep deprived driving is bad enough, it could be deadly.

Out of curiosity...

What if they were a train driver? Or bus driver? Or school taxi driver? Or pharmacist? Or just driving a car? All those things have the potential to harm, maim or kill multiple ppl at once - unlike a surgeon who can harm only one at a time whilst operating.

Why is a brain surgeon so special?

In a hospital, if every brain surgeon killed you but there was never a hospital aquired infection death, then that hospital would be a good hospital, except for those specifically going for brain surgery. Then not so good. The point is, healthcare is a combined effort and no aspect deserves some kind of prestige or devine awe above any other effort.

I'm not suggesting a nurses role is less than that of a surgeon at all. A brain surgeon will be doing invasive surgery on a very vulnerable organ. It isn't the same.

The only surgeon I know (although not a brain surgeon) is married to a train driver.

It's an impossible question to answer generally because in their house more lives are in the train drivers hands than the surgeons.

Whereas in another where the partner was in a safer role it would be different again

I would expect a brain surgeon who was a parent to take an active role in parenting their child that took into account the special circumstances of their role. So doing night feeds when they were not operating the next day, taking on more of the parenting role in the evening or hiring someone to provide assistance. Not saying oh well I’m a brain surgeon I can’t possibly lift a finger overnight ever.

No, I don't think that's a good idea. I'm a million miles away from being a brain surgeon and I'd struggle on that little sleep.

No their role is much more important.
The skill of a brain surgeon doesn't save a measurable significance number of lives compared to that of the skill of infection control nurses or timely drug administration or patient awareness by nurses.
Don't let the hype distort the facts. The most important factor in a hospital to the chances of you getting out alive is infection control. That's cleaners and nurses.

Yes, a brain surgeon with a baby will most likely need to be up during the night for a bit doing feeds. Any brain surgeon who falls into this category has the responsibility to proactively excuse themself from active duty doing brain surgery if and when they know or suspect that childcare interferes with their ability to do their job and might compromise the safety of their patients.

lol.

And if the neurosurgeon IS the mum?

Possibly yes, then they'd be fired. I'd much rather have a surgeon who had had adequate sleep in all honesty.

It makes me laugh so darkly that people think doctors in these jobs are getting a full eight hours every night, baby or not.

Surgeons don't operate every working day; they have days that are administrative, spent on consultations, follow ups etc. They also don't work 7 days a week. Would I want a surgeon to operate on 4 hours sleep? No. Would I expect them to plan their time so they have capacity on other nights to do some night wakings, because they have a day off, are on annual leave, Mat or Pat leave, or just not scheduled to operate the following day? Yes.