The nurse’s guide to MD specialists

Neurosurgery
Brilliant, with a necessary arrogance. Would you want somebody suffering pangs of self-doubt while his fingers are in your brain? Didn’t think so. Usually underfed and underslept. Will eat anything that’s moving slowly or standing still. Very nice people overall, since they have to deal with people who can’t talk, walk or make a lot of sense.

Neurology
Sweet, but from Mars. Odd sense of humor. Usually strange facial hair (on the men, not the women). Sometimes they have a fascination with Bach or zebras or rowing. Older neurologists tend to be courtly in the extreme and wear bow ties.

Orthopedics
The jocks of the medical world. They are carpenters and craftsmen—and I mean that as praise. A good orthopedist working on your hip will leave you with the equivalent of really good Art Deco woodwork: functional and beautiful, with nothing extra added. If you see a muscular young man or woman of few words striding down the hallway with a tiny box containing magnifying eyeglasses in his or her hand, that’s your orthopedist.

They also have a very strange sense of humor. A few months ago, the C group at our facility had “Talk Like a Pirate Day.” “Shiver me timbers! Swab the deck with that dressing, matey! AAARRR!”

Plastic surgeons, cardiothoracic surgeons and urologists –>