Surgeons and Top Performance

Health professionals, such as doctors and surgeons in particular, carry out operations that require a great deal of precision, coordination and calmness. These professionals manage operative and post-operative complications. At times they find themselves in situations where they communicate the deaths of loved ones to their families and instances where they may not be able to save lives.

All this generates a great emotional burden that over time could create insecurity, mistrust, fear and a burnout. This in turn could make people lose their passion for the work they do. While performing and supporting the workload and sacrifice is what makes these people great professionals, it is also what puts individuals at risk.

This is why developing resilience, reworking, increasing coping strategies, mental training and strengthening one's own resources are fundamental aspects to maintain high levels of performance.

To be able to "guide" these professionals as a Mental and Performance coach, it is necessary to do a defined analysis of contextualized intelligence in order to be able to use the right tools in a performance expansion path done together.

You must be, as defined by Dr. Charlie Brown- director of the project "Get your head in the Game", ‘anthropologists’ instead of ‘missionaries’.

 When I follow top performers, enthusiasm is not enough. Scientific research is needed, we need to have data available and evaluate what really works. This is typically defined in English as "what works for whom"!

This is why the Performance Expansion approach has a vision that aims towards scientific evidence and therefore enhances the culture of competence both in the techniques used and in the performer who is help.

Every intervention in order to succeed must adhere to the reality and the language of the context in which it is applied. In the case of surgeons it is necessary to approach the performance neurologically.

There are recent studies such as those by Anton, N., Bean, E., Hammonds, S., & Stefanidis, D. (2017) that investigate and highlight the mental skills of surgeons.

To be able to intervene with effective techniques, it is necessary to base oneself on the data validated by research in the fields of creative and sporting performance, as well as, in this case, that of surgery.

 Mental and Performance Training helps the performer to increase self-esteem, team spirit, surgical competence and teaches them to reduce stress levels.

The reality of the situation is that surgeons work in a particularly hard professional environment. Training involves numerous hours of practice  with the necessity to also use high levels of mental concentration.

Excessive workloads lead to high levels of stress for the brain and at most times there is little margin for error. The consequence could result in death.

The challenge is both physical and psychological especially when surgeons need to perform long hours of precise and risky procedures. For example, in laparoscopic procedures the surgeon manually uses instruments while looking at a monitor and the visual field is reversed.

There are also instruments such as the Da Vinci Robot that uses robotic hands; and the surgeon himself must also alternate his performance between these instruments.

Providing coaching on surgical performance involves having knowledge in the neurological field and in its scientific aspect. www.performanceexpansion.com

It is therefore necessary to know, in this regard, that when someone performs, this occurs in two ways; through the brain acting from top to bottom  i.e "top down brain", and from bottom to top i.e "bottom up brain".

The "top down brain" refers to the prefrontal part of the neocortex, which is the part of the brain that allows humans to perform tasks differently from other creatures. This part of the brain requires high energy levels, is neurologically slow and tires easily.

The bottom up brain brain includes those subcortical neural parts such as the basal ganglia and the amygdala. This is the area of the brain that is neurologically fast. It is always alert and uses less energy; it is sensitive to emotions and to primitive instinct.

Optimal performance requires both the top down brain for everything related to intentional learning, planning, strategies to manage impulsiveness, training to develop procedures, informed choices, and the bottom down brain that controls the execution of rapid fluid movements, that manages attention and the execution of long  complex procedures.

The 7 crucial mental abilities recognized by research in the field of performance are: setting goals, planning the execution of the task, management of activation, attention / management of thoughts, visualization / mental repetition, routine procedures before the execution of the task and the refocusing of strategies.

Many mental preparation trainings use top down in order for  it to become a bottom up neurological process, such as the competence in developing routine procedures and then making them become automated behaviors.

The top down neurological process is influenced by both internal and external language such as self talk. The bottom up however concerns images, rhythms and kinesthetic sensations.

The implications regarding these concepts are dependant on the competence that is required. It is necessary to evaluate whether to apply a top-down or vice-versa approach because, in some moments for example, as in the crucial aspect of peak performance, reasoning and thinking are aspects that could be disturbing.   In this case, the approach is very experimental focused on developing body, visual and experiential techniques seeing as the person is "in the zone" that is,  centered, focused  in the moment, ready for action.

The Performance Expansion program aims to use both neurological procedures in order to enhance your abilities, using both the prefrontal cerebral cortex and the subcortical, instinctive and experiential brain.

Thanks to the top down and bottom up approach, both cognitive, emotional as well as experiential and bodily techniques are developed to achieve peak performance hence helping professionals become "extra ordinary".