Residency Insight -- A PRESENT Podiatry eZine

Volume 5 - Issue 22

No matter what, no matter when, there comes a time when a decision has to be made. Chocolate or vanilla or swirl. Heels or flats. Red pill or blue pill. And so on. We make decisions all the time. Or we should if we are the good/great doctors and surgeons we could be. I believe that decision making is inherent in everything we do professionally. Failing to make a decision is worse than making a bad one.

Why do I say this and how is it related to being a podiatrist [and to life in general]? Well, I’m not the only one who thinks decisions are important. The whole field of self improvement and “Positive Mental Attitude” agrees. I think Anthony Robbins says it best with this statement: “At any moment, the decision you make can change the course of your life forever.”

Just now, you’ve decided to continue reading this and to see how I can show you that decision making is critical to your ability to be a great doctor/surgeon and being successful. Good decision, if I don’t say so myself. Making decisions is important, because without it, where would we be? I don’t know about you, but I’d still be in my kitchen staring at my acceptance letter from a college I never thought I’d get into after already having decided to go to my state university. That decision, as Anthony Robbins so succinctly said, changed the course of my life forever.

Doctors and surgeons hold great power with the decisions we make. Even with all our faults and problems splashed across the news channels and Internet, our patients look to us for advice and guidance. And by that, I mean that most patients come in with a problem and want us to tell them what to do. They may not do what we tell them and they may still do the opposite. That is after all their right. It is their body. But they really do want us to tell them ‘xyz is the best course to follow in your situation’.. No one wants a doctor or surgeon to say ‘oh, I don’t know, I don’t care, either way is fine.’ The public expects you to have an opinion, an EXPERT OPINION, on all things foot related, or have a reason why you don’t.

You should have a pretty good idea of what you’re going to do before you go into the OR. That decision should have been made before the consent was signed. Can you change what you do when you open the joint capsule and find that the bone has been replaced by polished and packed uric acid crystals? Absolutely. That Austin wouldn’t heal. Your decision needs to be guided and altered due to reality. And if you don’t accept reality, you end up with a result different than the one you wanted.

You need to be able to make decisions to be a good doctor. Sometimes people need difficult or painful procedures and you need to decide to do it or they end up suffering more. Patients need a starting point from which to make their own decisions. You have to decide how to proceed once they do. You have to decide what you want your life to be like so that you can make the decisions that will get you there [this school or that school, this partner or that partner, and so on through the years]. Heck, deciding which answer is correct on a test could be the most crucial decision of your life.

Decisions are hard to make sometimes. But make them you must. Your life, your career, your ability to repay your loans depends on it. So make them with at least the appearance of conviction. You will look like you know what you’re doing and sometimes that’s all that’s needed.