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 Check a surgeons quality by making sure they are board certified in the relevant specialty field.
Remember no one physician/surgeon will master every condition or surgical procedure in their specialty field, therefore finding their "special interest/expertise" of area is important. A general rule of thumb is usually between 2-5 conditions/surgical procedures they will master.
Contact via Website/phone the hospital where the surgeon performs surgery. Remember
Hospitals can be known to inflate a doctors credentials.
Research your surgeons Residency, Fellowship (if any), and other training, and match
these up with their current specialty field.
Check to see if your surgeon is also a clinical instructor, teacher-professor-of any kind.
Occasionally surgeons are affiliated with various medical societies (the more the better). .
Contact the fsmb for "disciplinary action(s) or sanction(s)" issued nationwide information.
A surgeons quality rating can be measured differently, however checking their training, education,
community involvement, licensure status, board certification, specialty expertise area, recognition, teaching responsibilities, and experience are critical factors in finding the best surgeons.
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Tips on how to check a
surgeons quality?
What does is mean for a
doctor to be board certified?
A board certified physician has completed an approved
educational training program and an evaluation process
including an examination designed to assess the knowledge,
skills and experience necessary to provide quality patient
care in that specialty.
Board
Certifications
The most
approved and accredited medical governing certification
board in America is the American Board of Medical Specialists.
They are the umbrella for 24 Member Boards such as:
Membership
Organizations
Membership
Affiliations
Membership Organizations of physicians involved in a
given field of practice. Specialty societies represent
the interests of practitioners. In most specialty societies
it is necessary to be board certified to be eligible
for membership.
Hospital
Affiliations
Information about a doctor's hospital affiliations will
tell you if the doctor has privileges at a particular
hospital and also serves to attest to his/her credentials.
It is recommended that your primary care doctor have
privileges where your surgeon does so that the primary
doctor can manage your general care following a surgical
admission.
Academic
History
Fellowship
Physicians attain Fellowship status in a specialty society
when they demonstrate outstanding achievement in their
profession. Typical criteria for fellowship in a specialty
society include years of membership, years as a practitioner
in the specialty and professional recognition by peers.
A period of training, usually 1-2 years, which occurs
after completion of a general or primary residency.
Its goal is to qualify a physician as a subspecialist
in an area of medical practice such as cardiology, hand
surgery, etc.
Residency
A variable period of postgraduate education and training
(3- 7 years), based upon the specialty selected, in
which a physician participates with the expectation
of becoming a specialist in a field of medical practice.
These educational experiences occur in a variety of
settings including hospitals, clinics, offices and other
relevant medical educational centers.
The process by which most medical students
obtain an appointment for their postgraduate training.
The matching process is performed by independent agencies
such as the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP).
The NRMP receives rank order preferences from students
and training institutions and "matches" them
by computer according to the highest ranked match. Residency
information is available from medical schools,
training programs, The AMA Directory
of Graduate Medical Education Programs, hard
copy and online, and the Fellowship and Residency Electronic
Interactive Data Access (FREIDA) service of the AMA.
Internship
The old term used to describe the first year of postgraduate
training following graduation from medical school. Physicians
participating in this training were formerly called
interns but are now known as Postgraduate Year 1 (PGY-1)
residents and the year is called the PGY-1 year. It
is usually taken under the sponsorship of a single clinical
department.
Subspecialty
Specialty
and Subspecialty
A subspecialist is a physician who has completed training
in a general medical specialty and then takes additional
training in a more specific area of that specialty called
a subspecialty. This training increases the depth of
knowledge and expertise of the specialist in that particular
field. For example, child and adolescent psychiatry
is a subspecialty of psychiatry, pediatric surgery is
a subspecialty of surgery, and cardiology is a subspecialty
of internal medicine and pediatrics. The training of
a subspecialist within a specialty requires an additional
one or more years of full-time education.
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