What's the coolest operation you've watched??

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Mine was a C-section, in the Army. Wsn't in nursing school, and at the time didn't know I would be 'ordered' into later by the Army? Slice, slice, slice- hand in, out comes a baby, in like a minute? The woman was awake, and little did I know what 'epidural was', and I thought: Om my god- they just cut into that woman without gassing her!

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Specializes in Assisted Living Nurse Manager.

I saw a Roux en Y anastomosis during my LPN clinicals. The surgeon was using a ruler to measure how much of the intestine he was going to remove. I could see all the organs within the abd and it was amazing. I still have a difficult time wrapping my mind around how much the body can endure.

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Amazing, eh? At the same time, really- life can be incredibly fragile.

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I watched an abdominal hysterectomy in nursing school. I had been to the OR already three times that semester, and this time it was a spur of the moment opportunity. It was our OBS clinical and I volunteered to work the gyne surgery side and let my classmates watch the births. I did the pre-op checklist on this patient and when the surgeon himself came to escort her to the operating room, my instructor suggested I ask if I could watch. He agreed.

The anesthetist remembered me and said, "Hey, you're back! Come here, you can stand behind the head drape with me!"

He placed my stool beside his equipment, showed me the patients vocal cords as he was intubating her, and because of where he put the stool, I got an incredible Birdseye view of the whole procedure.

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I scrubbed in on open heart surgery during an OR nursing course in nursing school and I was allowed to put my hands around the patient's heart at the end while it was beating. Pretty cool!!

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Specializes in ER, progressive care.

Fem-pop bypass in nursing school.

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A CABG in my nursing school preceptorship! Most amazing experience.

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A C-section on a 548lb patient and the removal of a breast "lump" the size of softball.

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Specializes in NICU, adult med-tele.

Not the most complicated procedure, but I love PDA ligations. Weaning vent settings almost immediately is pretty awesome.

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I watched a surgeon make nipples for a pt who had had her breasts removed and then got implants. He had invented a cool way of cutting and sewing that produced a really good-looking nipple :D

I actually thought that was more interesting than the CABG I got to see later. I got to stand behind the head drape, too, which was nice. I would not have dared to say I found the nipple job more fascinating, since some of my classmates would have killed to see a CABG.

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I scrubbed in on open heart surgery during an OR nursing course in nursing school and I was allowed to put my hands around the patient's heart at the end while it was beating. Pretty cool!!

Can't possibly beat this one. But, in here you never know what's going to pop up...

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watched a knee replacement once. Ortho Surgery sure is different! the surgeon offered the knee cap for me to inspect. I declined his offer. =)

Watching the OR team rushing into our PICU to crack open the chest of a fresh post-op cardiac Pt who's tamponading always gets the adrenaline pumping. I've always found the Heart interesting.

But I gotta say, the coolest operation I've seen....

I did CPR in the OR on a Pt while the Neurosurgeon was evacuating a clot from the cerebral bleed. Saw the brain and other tissues pink up during compressions.... and loss color with pulse checks. I believe my compressions were effective!

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