Editor’s Page: Complex Problems

My seven-year-old son is keeping his promise and sitting quietly next to me on his tablet while I conduct an after-hours interview video with Michelle Caird, an orthopedic surgeon and the subject of this issue’s cover story. Everything is going according to plan until seven’s mom walks in the door, and he just can’t help himself.

“Mom!” he screams. “I’ve been so good the whole time dad’s been talking to the lady in the computer, but now I gotta poop! Do you hear me, Mom? I gotta poop.”

He doesn’t need any help with that last part, he just likes to announce EVERYTHING — in this case loudly enough for Dr. Caird to hear. I apologize profusely for the background noise, but she’s more than gracious about the interruption. She’s also so generous with her time that she allows our interview to stretch beyond our agreed-upon window. That generosity and willingness to go above and beyond to educate our readers isn’t surprising. Ever since Outpatient Surgery Magazine started covering the broad topic of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion or DEI — beginning with a Special Issue on the subject in 2019 — the subject matter experts who have offered to share their insights with our editors have been just like Dr. Caird: extremely knowledgeable, exceedingly generous with their time and fiercely passionate about the topic.

In addition to a regular DEI column, we’ve been dedicating our cover story to DEI around this time of year since 2020. Each of the past five years we’ve highlighted a single cover story subject on the front of these issues, but as you can tell, this year’s cover is quite a departure. Our longtime Art Director Ethan Anderson deserves all the credit for that. “I think I have an idea,” he said before putting together a mockup of what you see on the cover of this issue.

Personally, I love what Ethan did here. It’s a visual representation of all the coverage we’ve purposely dedicated to this important topic and a celebration of the individuals who were willing to share their sometimes-difficult, always eye-opening stories. From top right to bottom left, there are 24 faces on the most prominent real estate of our June/July issue. (You can read more from all of them in a web exclusive here.

I’d be lying if I said that everybody is a fan of our editorial decision to add DEI to Outpatient Surgery Magazine’s subject matter. I’ve received a handful of a choice emails from readers staunchly opposed to our coverage — including a very memorable one from a reader (or spammer) who claims to have invented the phrase “go woke, go broke.” Some people have written in to say they believe in the concept of DEI but question industries and corporations’ sudden willingness to champion a cause they couldn’t care less about not long ago.

Jon Stewart did a phenomenal job questioning Corporate America’s sudden interest in Diversity (via Pride Month) in this “Daily Show” segment. But unlike the cookie company Stewart lambasts in the aforementioned segment, the healthcare industry should be different. Despite a cynicism that comes with age, I still believe that the overwhelming majority of healthcare providers — especially those we speak with — are driven by a need to best serve all patients.

I also believe that, as Dr. Caird puts it, complex problems require lots of different perspectives. OSM