At MUSC, residents do not perform procedures independently until they have been fully trained and performed the procedures successfully under supervision and to the satisfaction of the attending neurosurgeons. Residents never perform the key portions of operations without the presence of the attending neurosurgeon. Life saving procedures may be performed outside of the operating room by a resident who is trained and approved to do such procedures. Research has demonstrated that teaching hospitals have better outcomes than non-teaching hospitals when patients with similar severity of disease are compared. Part of this advantage for the patient comes from having a specialist in the hospital at all times.
Part comes from having several physicians in the same specialty involved with each patient's care.
This means that different points of view are represented, that it is less likely that possible diagnoses or treatments are overlooked and that more attention can be paid to the individual patient's care. When more people are involved in patient care, there is a greater chance that patients and their families may be overwhelmed by the complexity of modern medical care. The may receive explanations of diagnosis or treatment from several different people with different areas of expertise. This can be confusing. Usually, this apparent confusion is simply a matter of the same thing being explained in different ways.