First, do no harm – we say as we cut into our patients to cure them.
As surgeons, our Hippocratic oath is more complex than as physicians. Because of its contradictions, invasiveness, and immediacy surgical ethics both embraces and extends beyond medical ethics. At the Center for Humanism and Ethics in Surgical Specialties (CHESS) we seek to advance the good of our patients and our colleagues by understanding our paradoxes through reflecting on our social contract by publication, education, research, and community engagement.