It would be nice if someone came in the hospital with a good ol fashioned sore throat once in a while instead of “help, i’m being impaled by this big metal rod and by the way, the rod is stuck in him too”

Med Student
Intern (1st year of residency)
Resident (length of residency depends on specialty)
Chief Resident (optional)
Fellow (further specialization)
Attending

I went through 2.5 years of school for my Bachelors, and I’ll clock 2 years of employment before I can take the test to call myself an “Interior Designer” – all those shows on HGTV and TLC have people title-dropping like it’s nothing but most of them don’t have the background, or the license, to truly call themselves designers.

I thank Grey’s for teaching me the rankings within a hospital – do they at least have that right? Intern – Resident – Attending?

Now, for your other question. Surgeons and nurses are human, thus, errors will occur. We have layer upon layer of safeguards in place in the OR to prevent these events, but sometimes all the best practices can’t prevent a mistake. Our policy called for honesty with families. The surgeon generally explained what happened, and what we had done about it. The good news is, it’s rare for these errors to result in harm to the patient. It stinks, no doubt about it, and I spent a good deal of my time at the hospital working on policies and procedures to prevent mistakes.

Have you ever had a patient not fully go under and after he wakes up he tells you that he felt and heard everything?