Thoracic Surgeon

Thoracic Surgeon: a doctor who operates on the chest cavity and this includes the heart, lungs, and esophagus.

Quick Facts

Competitiveness: Moderate

Length of training: 7 to 8 years

Number of residency programs: 81

Number of residents in training: 244

Number in U.S. currently Board Certified in specialty: 5,167

First year median compensation: $245,000

Mean number of hours per week in patient care activities: more than 51.6.

Residency Information

You will complete a 5 year general surgery residency followed by 2 to 3 years of training in this specialty. You can receive additional training in:

• Congenital Cardiac Surgery- operative treatment of structural abnormalities involving the heart and major blood vessels.

Why Choose

Many surgeons had contact with a physician in this specialty while in medical school and this strongly influenced their decision.

Physicians like the aspect of helping critically ill patients whose outcomes depended directly on the operation. Doctors enjoy this specialty because it demands having a good technique in-order to have a good result.

Typical Schedule

You will work about 12 hours each day and spend your time in the hospital either rounding on patients or in surgery, which can last for many hours.

You will be on-call for your postoperative patients and be in frequent telephone communication with nurses who are caring for critically ill patients.

Because of the nature of the work, your patients will most likely be older adults between the ages of 55 to 60 years.

If You're Interested

You will want to spend time doing research and shadow a physician in this specialty to see if you have a true interest for this field of medicine.

Otherwise, it is good to do all of your pre-fellowship training at the same institution.

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