The Saad Truth with Dr. Saad - Which Surgeries Yield the Most Life Satisfaction for Patients？ (The Saad Truth with Dr. Saad_963)

In this episode, Gaj Saad talks about his recent visit to an orthopaedic surgeon, and what he learned from the man who performed his knee replacement surgery on him. Gaj also talks about why not all doctors are narcissistic god complex types, and why it s important to know why one person studies a particular medical specialty versus another.

00:00:00.120 Hi everybody, this is Gat Saad. A couple of days ago I visited an orthopedic surgeon for my knee

00:00:07.260 and it turns out that the gentleman in question is someone that I had gotten to know in summer of 1995.

00:00:15.960 We met when we were both vacationing in Cuba. He was traveling with a friend of his and I was also

00:00:25.760 on vacation and there he was a young guy 19 years old I think maybe first year university maybe not

00:00:33.660 even and so I remember him very well from those days but then we hadn't kept in touch although

00:00:39.880 the friend with whom he was traveling I had stayed in touch with a bit more and he had even become

00:00:46.220 a research assistant of mine for for a bit and it turns out that my wife went to high school with

00:00:57.320 him so they knew each other so we met up I mean he was just the absolute loveliest guy you could

00:01:03.300 imagine it kind of gave me renewed hope that not all physicians are just these narcissistic god

00:01:11.660 complex type of folks he was polite professional friendly he explained things he did give me a

00:01:19.080 very big shot of cortisone in my knee but what I want to talk about today is briefly the fact that

00:01:26.940 at one point we were chatting and I said to him you know I'm always interested in knowing why people go

00:01:33.240 and you know make the life choices that they make and I've you know why is it that one person studies

00:01:39.600 this particular medical specialty versus another and then I continued think chatting and I said

00:01:46.780 you know you look at for example psychiatry well the the standard joke is that a psychiatrist has never

00:01:53.780 cured a patient and so I wonder how they feel in terms of their purpose and meaning because they never

00:01:59.840 absolutely know whether they've helped someone on the other hand in your case this is me speaking to

00:02:05.160 the orthopedic surgeon friend of mine I said in your case someone comes in they have a ruptured

00:02:11.980 achilles tendon you fix it and their lives are better for it so you must score very highly on sort of

00:02:19.260 life satisfaction at life satisfaction at least when it comes to sort of your professional

00:02:24.260 responsibilities and he said and he answered me something that you know was actually quite

00:02:28.800 revealing he said actually the top three surgeries that provide the greatest amount of post-surgery

00:02:38.780 kind of life quality satisfaction are I think number one he said were hip surgery replacement number two

00:02:47.640 was cataracts which is something that Sir Harold Ridley pioneered and I discuss him briefly in my forthcoming

00:02:57.880 book suicidal empathy which you should go out and pre-order right away and then the third one is

00:03:03.720 knee replacement and he said and I said oh so you basically do number one and number three

00:03:09.740 so you must be at the apex of sort of occupational satisfaction he said absolutely so there you have it

00:03:17.500 folks a little interlude where I'm chatting with a orthopedic surgeon and incorporating some

00:03:27.020 issues that are of relevance to happiness occupational happiness psychology and so on and to the

00:03:35.680 surgeon in question you are truly the loveliest of physicians that I've met thank you for your help

00:03:43.980 cheers

00:03:44.380 cheers

The Saad Truth with Dr. Saad - February 05, 2026

Which Surgeries Yield the Most Life Satisfaction for Patients？ (The Saad Truth with Dr. Saad_963)

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript