On Tuesday, February 6, Dr. Chad Carlton, a Bariatric surgeon came to speak to medical society members about his field. Dr. Carlton spoke not only about bariatric surgery, but also gave the students a hands-on experience on how bariatric surgery works.
What is Bariatric Surgery?
A main portion of Dr. Carlton’s presentation was an explanation of bariatrics, a field many people probably haven’t heard of before. Bariatric surgery is basically a surgical method of treating weight loss. Dr. Carlton mainly deals with the stomach, but also the entire digestion system. With dealing with obese patients, Dr. Carlton finds ways to surgically make patients regulate the amount of food they eat, if they cannot do it on their own. With this, bariatric surgery consists of putting a lot of bands on the stomach or even cutting off portions of the stomach. To discuss all the different ways of treating weight loss, Dr. Carlton spoke about how many of his surgeries occur and even gave a video explanation on how he scrubs into a surgery and how he laparoscopically performs his bariatric surgeries.
Experiences of Being a Doctor
The other part of Dr. Carlton’s presentation was about his journey to becoming a doctor. With a lot of school and practice, Dr. Carlton reinforced that he became a doctor, and doesn’t matter whether you are at the top of your class because in the end each person who passes medical school is a doctor. Dr. Carlton then emphasized that what set all bright and intelligent doctors from others was their work ethic and confidence in being a doctor that would make them the most successful.
Hands-On Experience of Bariatrics
After Dr. Carlton’s presentation of what bariatrics is, he gave students a chance to actually understand what he does during surgery. Dr. Carlton explained how in surgery you cut off a part of your stomach and gave students the opportunity to practice with a foam stomach. Students were able to insert a blade into the surgical tool, cut off a piece of foam stomach, and repeat. This gave an emulated experience of what part of a gastric sleeve operation would be like.
Interview with Mrs. Boyle
Why do you think it is good to hear from doctors of different fields?
“I think it’s good to hear from different fields of medicine because at this point students might not know what is out there. Also, with what areas of medicine there are maybe something that a guest speaker says resonates with them that gets them excited and interested. And maybe one doctor could help a student begin to do research and figure out what they might want to do. I think it’s good to keep your options open because like some of the guest speakers have said is they didn’t really know what field of medicine they wanted to pursue until they were making their rounds in residency. Then they realize “Ok well I really don’t like surgery, but I really love this” or vice versa. Whatever situation I think it’s just good to have a large perspective of different medical fields.”
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