Teamwork in a Surgical Department

Teamwork is essential in surgery. A surgeon alone cannot fulfill his daily tasks. Surgical departments are divided into surgical teams: the surgical team in the operating theater, the surgical ward team, and the surgical emergency team. The common task of those teams is adequate patient care. The characteristics of team members describe necessary abilities such as: open communication, effective coordination skills, collaboration willingness, interdependency, mutual performance monitoring, backup behavior, adaptability, team orientation, and personality type. Team processes are recurring and ongoing short-term courses that occur in the team. The team developmental model separates the development of a team in four stages over a longer period of time. In the last stage, the team reaches the highest level of teamwork performance. Each team must be assessed for their nontechnical skills with team measurement tools. Surgical teams are insufficiently measured. There are possible disadvantages in teamwork, which must be considered and discussed versus the obvious benefits. Leadership is a process where the leading team member sets the direction for the others. There are different styles of leadership, whereby the dominant role of the leader is more or less pronounced. Leadership and teamwork are not contradicting characteristics of teams in the surgical department.