A Global Journey in the OR

As a surgeon, I’ve had the unique privilege of stepping into operating rooms on nearly every continent. Each time I put on scrubs and wash my hands at the sink, I’m reminded that medicine, and especially surgery, is one of the few professions where the rituals, the ethics, and the language are strikingly similar no matter where you are in the world.

There’s something deeply comforting about that. I may not speak the local language fluently. The OR might look different—sometimes a high-tech facility in Germany, other times a modest rural clinic in East Africa. But once the patient is prepped and the team is assembled, we all fall into the same rhythm. The scalpel, the sutures, the shared focus—they speak a language of their own.

The Rituals That Bind Us

One of the first things you notice when walking into an operating room anywhere in the world is how ritualized the environment is. There’s the same careful choreography: handwashing, gowning up, glove snapping into place, the time-out to confirm the patient and procedure. These steps are not just protocol—they’re sacred. They mark the transition from the everyday to something more precise, more intentional, and deeply human.

I’ve seen this ritual followed with near-religious reverence in Tokyo, and with equal seriousness in a mobile tent hospital in the aftermath of a natural disaster. It’s as though the OR becomes a kind of sanctuary, where the outside world falls away and all that matters is the human life on the table. Regardless of where we are, we take a collective breath and begin. That sense of focus is shared—and it’s powerful.

Speaking Through Our Hands

Communication in surgery is unique. We rely on short, sharp commands and a lot of nonverbal cues. A nod, a glance, the way a hand reaches out—these are all deeply understood in the OR. It’s a language you learn not from textbooks but through repetition, observation, and immersion.

Once, during a medical mission in South America, I worked with a local team whose English was limited and my Spanish was even more so. But we barely needed to speak. I asked for instruments with gestures, and they responded with quiet efficiency. When things got tense, our eyes met and we adjusted course without a word. That kind of communication is built on trust, professionalism, and a shared goal: doing right by the patient.

Ethics Without Translation

Perhaps the most powerful example of our universality is the ethical compass that guides us. The Hippocratic Oath, or some version of it, resonates in every place I’ve practiced. Whether I’m working alongside colleagues in Scandinavia, Southeast Asia, or Sub-Saharan Africa, the core values remain the same: respect for life, a commitment to do no harm, and the duty to care for each person equally.

I remember a case in a war zone where supplies were limited and triage decisions were incredibly difficult. The local doctors and I had differing cultural backgrounds and medical training, but our values aligned perfectly. We debated hard, we made tough calls—but always with the patient’s well-being front and center. That kind of alignment transcends borders and speaks to something fundamental in all of us who choose this work.

Lessons From Every Culture

Traveling and working internationally has taught me that no one system or approach has all the answers. In some countries, I’ve learned about resourcefulness—how to do more with less. In others, I’ve seen incredible innovation and the seamless integration of technology. I’ve watched surgeons in rural clinics improvise with tools we might throw away, and I’ve seen robotic-assisted surgeries in gleaming hospitals that feel more like spaceships than ORs.

Each time, I take something home with me. Sometimes it’s a new technique, other times it’s a new way of thinking about patient care or team dynamics. The best surgeons are perpetual students, and working across cultures has made me more humble and more open-minded. It also reinforced a deep sense of gratitude—for my own training, for my colleagues worldwide, and for the opportunity to serve.

More Than Just Medicine

In the end, surgery is about healing. But it’s also about humanity. What unites us in the operating room is not just our skill, but our shared purpose. Whether it’s stitching up a wound or removing a tumor, we are part of a global brotherhood and sisterhood that operates beyond politics, borders, or beliefs.

I’ve come to believe that surgery—done right—is one of the purest expressions of empathy and solidarity. You place your hands, your knowledge, and your heart at the service of another human being, often one you’ve only just met. And you do it not because of nationality or language, but because of a quiet promise we all made when we chose this path: to help, to heal, and to never stop learning.

So yes, surgery has its own language. But more importantly, it has a soul. And that soul speaks fluently, wherever you are in the world.