To reject trainee surgeon?

I think it down the to the individual to decide whether they want a trainee. They will still learn irrespective as their always be patient that will be happy to proceed.

Also to add - you do have the right on whether a trainee does your surgery. - sometimes it advantageous to have done by trainee as you will be seen quicker.

I think you have to make the best decision based on what is right for you. My answer would be dependent on what type surgery and the long term implication. I have had minor surgery and major surgery. I never met the surgeon prior to my surgery and I got a final report from the consultant. I never had any follow up. However, when I had eye surgery and another surgery I was very particular abut who did the surgery. I think it is important to know how many surgeries the person has completed. Being a consultant doesn't mean you are a good doctor or surgeon.

Hi op, I think its terminology used to those who don't understand medicine. I got asked if a student could operate for my jaw surgery but as these comments show, he'd have been well qualified. I said yes but as it turned out, the consultant did it in the end and he botched it right up! Nice bloke but unfortunately didn't go the best op so will be revising it. I'd have preferred someone to really take their time. Ask questions if you're unsure.

This forum isn't exclusively for women or mums, despite the name and this post is about a little boy.

As many people have said, there won't usually be a choice if you choose to use the NHS. You also haven't thought about the consequences of not letting anyone else learn and develop their skills at all.

you absolutely do have the right to not have a trainee do surgery on you/your child.

YANBU @RunningThroughMyHead if you’re not comfortable you should tell them.

100%, I was one for a year before returned to training. Very much considering being one again too post-cct. (May as well get the cct now have a few months left but somewhat disillusioned with consultant life

Very few situations in the UK where the patient isn’t paying, though normally through taxation rather than directly.

But even if it was a charitable effort, do you think the OP shouldn’t consider whether the skill of the surgeon is sufficient given their DC, who is too young to evaluate the risk himself, has their eyesight at stake?

Are you paying?

Not wrong at all. I had cataract surgery at the London Eye hospital. First eye, senior surgeon. She then handed over to a junior who fiddled and farted with the other eye..the lense didn't go in properly and it was a faff .has never been quite right. Thens the breaks with free health treatment unfortunately

As soon as anyone says this, they lose any of my sympathy.
As I said earlier in this thread, I work in the NHS and have the ‘I pay your wages’ thrown at me when people are trying to stamp their feet and get their own way - as I know most public facing public servants have.
Unless you’re top 1%, I doubt your tax contribution would come close to covering the cost of a highly complex eye operation plus the pre and post op care (I’d imagine your child has already had multiple appointments).
I do understand your worry, although I believe it’s needless as I explained earlier.
If you want to name your surgeon, you’ll need to go private.

With a trainee doing the surgery, I guarantee that every bit of your child's op will be checked, double checked and triple checked by the consultant. It's their registration and reputation at risk of something goes wrong and it's because they've not supervised sufficiently.
In some ways, your child will be better cared for than if the consultant was just doing the op on their own.
I say this as a uni academic who has had the pleasure of the consultant bringing their juniors on the ward round and explaining things in great detail, and also the pleasure of the consultant on their own explaining to me in not as much detail. Still detailed, mind you! The joys of being a colleague...

Probably would have been better to correct the OP to use the techically coreect terms, then people would know what you're talking about....

Especially given half the problem here is people are using the terms student, junior, registrar, resident and trainee interchangeably which alters perception of what each one actually is.

Who d’you think’ll be doing the paediatric surgery in 10-15yrs time then when the current consultants retire and no one has been able to complete an adequate training programme? Gonna be a bit sad for all the kids that need operations then….they’ll just have to wait until they’re adults.

It is, because this is a women's forum, and most of the responses or condoning this risk will be from women.

If there's a choice, the least risky choice is best because otherwise you're taking a gamble on someone else's body, more than is actually necessary.

True, but this is regarding a child.

If someone wants to take those risks on themselves, that is their decision, but I don't think a loving parent should be taking any kind of risk that's unnecessary if it's not themselves that are going to suffer dire consequences on their own bodies if something goes wrong.

I was using the language OP used, she’s a registrar but would be considered a student by OP’s post. It’s not hard to use comprehension skills.

In my previous life, I was an opthamology nurse.

I would prefer the Resident to do a surgery for the sheer fact they are supervised and take their time.

I've witnessed fully qualified eye surgeons crow that they could do a cataract surgery in nine minutes and push through 35 patients in a day.

I've seen a surgeon pass out in the OR and the Resident had to finish the surgery. How would you like to witness the surgeon going down as he operated on your eye? That one took a lot of apologizing and smoozing to clear up.

But hey question a fully qualified doctor finishing up their specialty training.

There is aload of bollocks on this thread.

Students do not do operations or give anaesthetics.

Resident doctors can start using a Mr/Ms/Miss title very early on post graduation (around 18months) if they power through their exams. So don't base your assessment of expertise on that alone.

Some specialities do exams very late on during their training period e.g orthopaedics have an exit exam.

I'm a consultant we do graded exposure - at the weekend I did a few cases - a tiny baby which i completely took charge for, an older kid with additional needs where I supervised the resident doctor from the coffee room and a big teenager where I provided supervision from the end of my mobile phone.

Our hospital consent forms say that a member of the team rather than a specific staff member will operate. In certain circumstances making a request that only a consutant operate could be actively detrimental eg. if the consultant is at home but a suitably qualified resident doctor is on site and the condition is life threatening.

It's normal to be anxious but do be reassured that a surgeon in training isn't necessarily a bad thing. A family member had a bad outcome after bilateral knee surgery. The (experienced) consultant ruefully commented to me that of course it was the side they'd done that was the problem. Not the one the reg had done.

Also we tend to get help if we need it. I have a sub specialty interest and skills. It's not unusual for consultant colleagues to ask me to undertake niche procedures on their patients as they don't do them very often and I do several each month.

Come on @RunningThroughMyHead, of course you contribute to the NHS and your family's treatment on it with the NHS.

And they take on responsibility for sourcing pipeline of GPs, specialists & surgeons - training them up AND deciding when they are ready/need experience with adding new surgical procedures.

If you are not happy with the NHS's decision on who will perform the surgery on your child, you are - of course - welcome to withdraw the patient from the list.

Or go private so you can select exactly who your preferred surgeon is and pay accordingly.

You pay a contribution. It is very unlikely you will pay enough this year to cover the cost of your son's surgery, let alone everything else he will have had leasing up to that.

I think for your peace of mind, you need to make a phone call and ask the questions to the hospital themselves. If you're still not happy with their answers, request a different dr, but I would hear them out properly 1st

Are you paying in as much as you’re getting out though, given that your child is having a specialised operation?
(Not that you would have to be, as this is exactly how the system is supposed to work, but something to consider if you think you’re paying enough to decide which highly qualified medical professional meets your criteria)

NHS is free at the point of access for citizens. We don’t directly pay for it. If you are referring to taxes / NI then that is for a range of public services with some of it going into the NHS.

We are extremely lucky to have an NHS service. In other countries you would pay taxes and separately still have to pay for medical insurance… which may or may not cover the costs of such an operation. Or you would pay privately as needed. Even if covered via insurance you still couldn’t dictate who did the operation.

Maybe the student is the person who’s been doing these surgeries daily and the experienced person has been watching to make sure that it’s done correctly, which is usually the case a majority of the time, how else are students going to gain experience and learn??