Decision Making in Surgery

Surgeons face unique challenges in perioperative decision making and communication with patients and families. In cardiothoracic surgery, the stakes are high, life and death decisions must be made quickly, and surgeons often lack a long-standing relationship with patients and families prior to intervention. This review considers specific challenges in the preoperative period followed by those faced postoperatively. While preoperative deliberation and informed consent focus on reaching a decision between two or more alternative approaches, the most vexing postoperative decisions often involve the patient’s discontent with the best-case outcome or how to ensure goal-concordant care when complications arise. This review explores the preoperative ethical and legal requirement for informed consent by describing the contemporary preferred method, shared decision making. We also present a framework to optimize surgeon communication and promote patient and family engagement in the setting of high-risk surgery for older patients with serious illness. In the postoperative period the family is often tasked with deciding what to do about major complications when the patient has lost decision-making capacity. We discuss several examples and offer strategies for surgeons to navigate these challenging situations. We also explore the concepts of clinical heroism and futility in relation to communicating with patients and families about the outcomes of surgery. Persistent ethical challenges in decision making suggest that surgeons should improve their skills in communicating with patients to better engage with them, both before and after surgery.