EYE OPENER During her time as a patient, anesthesiologist Nina Singh-Radcliff, MD, picked up some valuable insights.

I'm an anesthesiologist. A few months ago, I had surgery in an outpatient facility and experienced how different it is to be on the table rather than above it. It was a tremendous learning experience. I learned that there's more to caring for a patient than performing the technical aspects of our jobs.

1 Keep the patient updated on schedule changes.
The case before mine ran 45 minutes long. I didn't have family or friends sitting with me to soak up the time. The wait seemed like an eternity. Thankfully, the nurses checked in on me periodically to see if I needed anything, like a blanket or a bathroom visit.

2 Introduce each member of the
surgical team and shake your patient's hand.
Other than my surgeon and physician anesthesiologist, I didn't know the members of the medical team who would be caring for me. In any other professional setting, walking up to and touching a person without permission or introducing yourself is highly inappropriate. I appreciated it when the team members told me their names and what their roles were in the procedure.

3 Keep the pre-operative area quiet and peaceful.
Having surgery is tremendously emotional and stressful. The last thing I wanted to hear among the surgical staff was a review of the football game the night before or a debate over the latest news from Washington.

4 Keep the patient warm in the pre-operative holding area.
I hate being cold. I have self-diagnosed myself with Raynaud's because I actually feel pain when I'm cold. As you can imagine, when I was dressed in an OR gown, I was uncomfortably cold. But I was given an abundant supply of warm blankets in the pre-operative holding area, which was fabulous. The OR bed was pre-warmed with the warming blanket before I entered, and it was immediately placed over me when I got onto the table. Being kept warm was such a comfort.

5 Keep the conversation among surgical staff professional.
It was very refreshing that no one complained that they were tired, frustrated, working too hard or hadn't had a break. Nor did they exchange idle gossip during my surgical experience. It's so easy as part of the surgical team to forget that even though it's your work area, the focus should remain on the patient. During my procedure, the surgical staff made me feel that everyone was thinking only about me.

6 Preserve the patient's dignity.
Don't needlessly expose the patient when putting equipment on her. Put on monitoring equipment in a way that leaves the patient feeling dignified. Decorum should not be a privilege, it should be a patient right. I had surgery at an institution where I'd formerly taught. A proceduralist who was a former student of mine was seeing patients next door to my pre-operative holding area. My anesthesiologist was a former colleague of mine. I certainly didn't want people I knew to see more of me than they should have.