A Day In The Operating Room Essay, Research Paper

Mark Musser

A Day in the Operating Room

The most unique experience I have ever had would have to be spending a day with my Uncle Dave. My Uncle Dave is a Vascular Surgeon in Lancaster County. He graduated from Juniata College s pre-medicine program and is currently is in his own practice.

Back in the summer of 1999 he was still with the hospital group, and he invited me to come stay at his house and go to the hospital in the morning with him. With the hospitals permission I was allowed to go around with him and watch him do all his daily rounds of all his patients. During these rounds, we visited all of his patients, gave them a brief examination, and took care of any problems or complications that had developed.

Without any doubt the most exciting part of the day was the two operations I was able to observe. We went to the operating room where the patient being prepped for the first surgery of the day. This surgery was a bypass of an aneurysm of the aorta, which is a very serious operation that normally takes four hours. We then went outside the operating room to scrub up for surgery. My uncle used the special sponges and soap to scrub his hands and arms, and we were ready to begin.

He began the operation by making an incision from the belly button up to the top of the rib cage. I stood beside the anesthesiologist who is positioned by the head of the patient. He and my uncle kept me informed about everything that was being done to the patient. After they moved the intestines out of the way, I was able to see most of the major organs, such as the heart and the lungs. I could see the aorta leading into the heart, the aneurysm looked like a bubble in the aorta very close to the heart. First, they clamped the aorta near the heart. Then they cut the aneurysm open with a scalpel. They put a tube into the aorta to bypass the aneurysm, sewed up the wall of the aorta, and began to close up the chest cavity.

I was informed about all the equipment being used in the operation. The machine that I thought was the most interesting was the Cell Saver. The Cell Saver is a machine that processes the blood from the patient s body, removing the impurities before the blood is returned to the body.

Once that surgery was over my uncle and I went to get some lunch at the hospital cafeteria. After lunch there was still one more surgery for that day. This operation wasn t as serious as the other one; a patient needed to have a port installed for frequent blood work. This was the most exciting and memorable day of my life, one that I will remember for a long time.