General surgery is a surgical specialty that focuses on abdominal contents including esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, liver, pancreas, gallbladder, appendix and bile ducts, and often the thyroid gland. They also deal with diseases involving the skin, breast, soft tissue, trauma, peripheral vascular surgery and hernias and perform endoscopic procedures such as gastroscopy and colonoscopy.

What is the role of General Surgeon?

A general surgeon is a physician who has been educated and trained in the diagnosis and preoperative, operative, and postoperative management of patient care.

The general surgeon is trained to provide surgical care for the whole patient. This includes making a diagnosis; preoperative, operative and postoperative management of the patient; and the surgical treatment of the:

• alimentary tract;
• abdomen and its contents, including the pelvis;
• breast, skin and soft tissue; and
• endocrine system.

It includes head and neck surgery, pediatric surgery, surgical critical care, surgical oncology, trauma and burns, transplants and vascular surgery.

General surgeons may sub-specialize into one or more of the following disciplines:

• Trauma surgery/ Surgical Critical Care: General surgeons must be able to deal initially with almost any surgical emergency. All general surgeons are trained in emergency surgery. Bleeding, infections, bowel obstructions and organ perforations are the main problems they deal with.
• Laparoscopic surgery: This is a relatively new specialty dealing with minimal access techniques using cameras and small instruments inserted through 3 to 15mm incisions. Robotic surgery is now evolving from this concept. Gallbladders, appendices, and colons can all be removed with this technique.
• Colorectal surgery: General surgeons treat a wide variety of major and minor colon and rectal diseases including inflammatory bowel diseases
• Breast surgery: General surgeons perform a majority of all non-cosmetic breast surgery from lumpectomy to mastectomy, especially pertaining to the evaluation, diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer.