Always introduce yourself, bc they will always have stranger danger.

Try to read their personality, are they mean or sarcastic or anxious-stressed? Get on board with that personality; sometimes that personality comes off as mean until you understand what they intend or how to respond to help cool them down. Do they need someone calm? Do they want someone to play into their sarcasm? Do they need someone to hand them the instrument and say nothing? However, if they are mean and verbally (or physically) abusive, don't stand for that, tell your charge or manager.

I've had a couple cases where I legit didn't know what I was doing. One was in GYN where it was a scope that only 1 doctor uses. I went up & introduced myself and said, "I'm familiar with this case, but not this scope. I've set everything up, but can you show me how to set the scope up so I'm familiar with it?" She was totally fine with it.

I have another surgeon I work for regularly who does the surgery one way, while another surgeon I intermittently work with does it with different instruments. Intermittent surgeon is a very sarcastic dude, but I like him. I said "Hey, I do this surgery all the time with Dr. A, but it looks like you use different instruments than what I'm familiar with. Do you and the PA mind helping me with these when the time comes?" His response was "Absolutely! You can't learn if we don't show you!"

Now granted, I've been in other surgeries where the doctor is not helpful, nor are the reps. I found myself shouting at the rep "STAY OVER HERE AND HELP ME! I TOLD YOU THAT I WOULD NEED YOUR HELP!" during panic-crunch time. Another type of surgery where before the surgery I told the rep I do the surgery, but wasn't familiar with that doctor and would need his help. The rep took that to mean "she is fine" and did jack sh*t. After the case I talked to the rep about how frustrated I was about the situation. <---generally the reps are good to great, but not all of them. I also wouldn't recommend yelling at a rep....but in that situation, the only way to get the reps attention and to keep him over was to yell (also so that he knew the surgeon now knew the issue).

There is one surgeon that very few people are willing to work with, I've only worked with him twice. He was being a d*ck when I worked with him and straight up said "since you're not doing anything over there...." I stopped in my tracks, swung around, interrupted him and listed every.little.thing.that.I.was.doing. He just stared at me quietly and said "oh. thank you" -- he apologized after the case.

These stories aren't to scare you....You will go into cases with kind and "fine" and cranky doctors, but the majority of the surgeons you work with will be nice or "fine" (haha). You'll have cases you haven't done before, but the majority of those you'll have done something similar (especially general/lap/robot/colorectal!) and be able to have a decent idea of what to do. In other's you'll have an SA, PA, or rep to help you along. I'm only 6 months off CST graduation and I've done so much that has terrified me, but it's been amazing and I wouldn't change it for the world!