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Summary: Becoming a surgeon is for the individual with a passion for helping people improve their lives and the fortitude to complete the necessary training. Learn why orthopedic surgeon chose his profession in this free video on medical career information.
Richard T. Jackson has been an orthopedic surgeon for 27 years. He currently practices in Provo, Utah connected with the hospital doing sports medicine.read more
"As far as the question of why I became a physician. I had a strong family influence from my Father who was a general surgeon. I saw the satisfaction of his life as he dedicated himself in the profession. And it exposed me to those things which I felt comfortable in pursuing as a premed student. Because of the influence of my Father I had always dreamed of being his partner as a general surgeon. It became apparent to me after some time in training that I would have more enjoyment in dealing with the aspects of orthopedic surgery and so I made that selection. Now the interesting thing is in medicine that you can always make the decision to change and with the appropriate investment of time you can do that. I spent three years in training as a general surgeon, decided to change to be an orthopedist, resubmitted my application to enter in a residency program, was admitted and then it required another four years of training for me to be able to be qualified and certified to serve and to practice as an orthopedist. So training can be anywhere from three to four years to ten years depending on what you want to accomplish. A clarification on education. High school education, college education, you have to have excellent grades. Four years of medical school, one year of internship and then anywhere from three to eight years of residency training in certain super specialties to qualify you to be a physician with any of the children fields of expertise and special training. Residency is the time where you serve working under the direction of a University department of medicine. And you spend most of your time in the hospital taking care of patients that are brought to the hospital by physicians who are already in practice. You work along side them to do their, to take care of most of their patient care and generally as is surgery you scrub with them and after some time scrubbing with them then they allow you to be the primary surgeon and you gradually develop your acumen of expertise."