Cardiothoracic surgery: a specialty in transition—good to great?

During Dr Alfred Blalock’s speech accepting the Presidency of the American Surgical Association, he said, “It’s a long way to this podium from Culloden, Georgia.” For me, it is an even longer way from Fort Thomas, Kentucky. It has been a real honor to serve you and this organization. This past year I have been blessed working with such energetic and dedicated members of our Board and various workforces throughout the organization. Anything that I have achieved is directly due to these individuals. I would like to especially thank my faculty and residents who have supported me in all my endeavors. I am particularly proud to have them as my colleagues and friends. I have been particularly fortunate to have such wonderful mentors and friends during my career. These include my physician-brother Raymond who provided my initial inspiration to go into medicine; Dr Ward O. Griffin, who as Chairman of Surgery at the University of Kentucky, was a wonderful role model; Dr Norman Shumway, former Chairman of Cardiovascular Surgery at Stanford University a humble, charismatic person who provided the excitement for me for cardiac surgery; Dr Bruce Reitz, my best friend and former Chief of Cardiac Surgery at Johns Hopkins; and Dr Vincent Gott, Chief of Cardiac Surgery at Johns Hopkins, for 17 years who remains a supportive friend and mentor to me. I would like to particularly thank my wife and best friend Betsy and my three children, Bill, Jr., Amy, and Mark for their understanding and support of me over these many years. Cardiothoracic Surgery will continue to progress in its leadership prominence in patient care, innovation and discovery, and residency education at local and national levels. I hope to reinforce this message to you, that although there are many important issues facing us today, we are a specialty that in fact will transition from being good to being great. I have been somewhat of a student of Jim Collins, who was a former faculty member at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and has authored two books investigating why certain companies are considered the best and most enduring among their peer institutions. His recent book entitled, “Good to Great” is an investigation of what characterizes a company that goes from being considered good to being great [1]. A great company demonstrated cumulated stock returns that on average were 7 times greater than the general stock market over a period of several years. Collins contrasts these companies with a comparison group of companies who remained good but did not make the leap to greatness. Several concepts that characterize these good to great companies can be directly attributed to our specialty of Cardiothoracic Surgery. We are presently confronted with a number of issues that are core to our specialty. I view these issues as opportunities by which we can grow from a good to a great specialty of surgery. I suggest to you that we as a collective group of surgeons as well as our specialty organizations have what it takes to transition our field by capitalizing on these opportunities. Although major issues such as escalating malpractice premiums, financial debt incurred by our students and residents, and the challenge of resident work hours are deserving of comment, these areas are not specific to our profession. We as thoracic surgeons need to form strong coalitions with other members of the medical profession who as a group need to address these important issues facing all of us in medicine. Particularly in the area of malpractice, we as a Society should align ourselves with the American College of Surgeons. This will be a priority for the STS in the upcoming year. The issues pertinent to Presented at the Thirty-ninth Annual Meeting of The Society of Thoracic Surgeons, San Diego, CA, Jan 31–Feb 2, 2003.