The inspiring skillset of a combined cardiac anesthesiologist + ICU physician

as a nurse who's worked with him, he is such a gift to the hospital and a wonderful doctor!!

That was a well-done interview, Max. Having formerly been a health care practitioner, I think he had two golden pieces of advice for students: 1) go spend lots of time with people who do the thing you're interested in, and 2) make sure you really understand what it's like to do the thing as opposed to just the intellectual aspects of that endeavor, which is also probably solved with number 1.

As a guy in Stage 3 kidney disease, that floating salt cracked me UP a LOT - shows you have a great sense of humor!! Excellent video!

One of the challenging experiences I had as an apheresis nurse was having to do a plasma exchange through a cardiac bypass machine in the OR. Complicated case. The child was 10 years old and had undergone a heart transplant but the heart was rejected. Believe it or not, there was a second heart that was flown in and wasn’t rejected. The plasma exchange was done to get rid of the complement protein in her blood which had accumulated during the first transplant. So I continued the apheresis through the bypass machine during the 2nd transplant. And 7 days later this precious little girl was up walking around looking like she’d never had any major surgery let alone 2 heart transplants in one day! It was a scary experience for me never having done the exchange through a bypass machine, but everyone was so helpful. One of the craziest things I saw after the surgery was over, as I was leaving the hospital so many hours later, the cardiac surgeon was outside the ER smoking a cigarette! I guess he deserved it. Wonderful man who taught in the USA and went to Europe to teach other doctors interested in doing pediatric cardiac surgery.

His advice is spot on at the very end. If you don't like the day to day realities of the job then it's not a good fit for you. I like the idea of computer programming but I could never imagine sitting at a computer all day every day. I much prefer my time in the hospital on my feet all day, interacting with others.

Great video for aspiring anesthesiologists

Its interesting that these are two split specialties in the USA. In France, Anesthesiologists can work in the ICU and in the OR without additional training (Although a new ICU only specialty has been added recently). Always cool to see how systems differ. I'd love to see a video on a CRNA on your channel one day! Great stuff as always Max

Great advises at the end. Worth listening to.

Some great advice there that can be applicable to many careers outside medicine also. Great interview 👏

Max, these videos are so insightful! Please don't ever stop doing them! Bottom line, please don't stop being you!

wow, so much information about a number of things. Learned so much!

That last advice was GOLDEN - day to day vs the idea/intelectual content of the specialty... thank you!

Great interview.. It seems the heart/lung machine requires intense skill to operate and having a team that is prepared for every scenario represents the best of the best.

Knowing someone who ended up in the ICU with a life threatening infection following a minor back surgery and almost died but amazingly recovered after being in an induced coma and having quadruple amputations after her limbs died as a result of the infection it’s a really hard job that ICU workers have but I’m sure that the successes make it all worth it or at least more bearable for them, kudos to anyone who works in that environment and thanks for this informative video!

Excellent interview!

That was fascinating. Thank you both so much!

Excellent interview, loved this video!!!

That was awesome, I learned so much! I really enjoy donating to the anesthesiologist Foundation, since it was hard for me to go to college because of my cerebral palsy, I really wanted to be a anesthesiologist physician, it takes a special person to be a anesthesiologist or CRNA and y’all are one of them! Anesthesiologist is the best

Thank you for asking about his Fear response and how he critically thinks! That's something i ask other docs and CRNAs frequently for CRNA school.

Really found the advice on how to decide on your specialty insightful, thank you