Antifragile orthopaedic surgeons: a reflection on the training experience

Abstract

I’m a newly qualified orthopaedic surgeon. It was the hardest thing I have ever done.

This essay is a reflection on the things I learnt doing it.

I could say that I ‘burnt out’ during my surgical training. But that expression has been used to describe such a range of symptoms, from someone merely feeling depressed, to being the cause of a colleague’s suicide, that it has lost most of its meaning. 

In May 2019 the World Health Organization (WHO) clarified the term, and it has its own ICD-11 code now: ‘QD85’. It’s not a disorder as such, but one of the ‘factors influencing health status or contact with health services’, specifically related to one’s work environment.¹