Dr. Joshua John-Ram Schacter walks through whether elective orthopedic surgery makes sense for you right now. He weighs the direct costs, lost wages, time away from family, and asks the hard question: who actually benefits most, you or the health system?
So you come into an orthopedic surgeon's office, and the first thing that you hear is, you need surgery. Well, is that actually the best option for you? There's a number of different ways to weigh this. There are financial costs to surgery. There are costs to you and your family not being able to go to work. There are costs to your job not having you at work for a prolonged period of time. There are a lot of costs associated with surgery. And as long as those costs are outweighed by the benefits to you, then surgery is worth it. So I think that that's something that you always have to ask when you're contemplating a major orthopedic surgery. Who stands to benefit most from this procedure? Is it me, the patient that stands to benefit the most from this procedure in terms of, do I have to take too much time off? Will I lose too much money from my job? How will my job react to my surgery? Um, what kind of. What kind of impact am I putting on my friends and family?
As long as that equation equals benefit for the patient, then I think that surgery is entirely reasonable. But when that equation.
Leans more towards, well, the hospital will benefit from me being and having this surgery, the doctoral benefit, the physical therapy, departmental benefit.
I think those are things that you have to think about. I think those are things that you have to consider when you're thinking about an elective orthopedic surgery.
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