How to choose a surgeon? Skill of surgeon is crucial in surgical operation success. How to choose the best surgeon? What is a critical factor in choosing a surgeon? Pioneering cardiac surgeon shares his wisdom. How to choose the best surgeon for any operation. Dr. Anton Titov, MD. How to choose a surgeon? Professor Lawrence Cohn is a pioneering cardiac surgeon. He gives advice how to find the best heart surgeon. How to find great heart surgeon? Dr. Lawrence H. Cohn, MD. Surgeon must do many hundreds of exact operations that patient needs. Experience is the most important factor in quality of surgeon. Best surgeons work faster and have fewer complications. Leading surgeons perform much better than other surgeons. How to choose a surgeon. How to find good surgeon. 1234 This brings us to the very important question. Dr. Anton Titov, MD. How can a patient choose a medical specialist? How can a patient choose a surgeon? There is an increasing amount of clinical outcomes data (it is surgery results) for individual surgeons available in the US. Other countries perhaps do not have similar data transparency about clinical outcomes. But oftentimes the method of presentation of results of the surgery and availability of these data does not help the patients. Clinical outcomes information confuses patients even more. How should a patient choose a cardiac surgeon? 1234 (Cardiac Surgeon, Harvard Medical School) Dr. Lawrence H. Cohn, MD. Well, I think a lot of choosing a surgeon by patients is by referring doctors and and cardiologists. It's not about just the risk of the operation per se. But it is how much experience the surgeon has in doing the exact operation that you have to have. Particularly it is true with mitral valve repair surgery. Surgeon needs to have done many operations to become good at mitral valve repair operation. Cardiologist might send a patient to a new surgeon. This new surgeon has done only 5 of these surgeries in his life. That is a problem. But another patient is sent to a cardiac surgeon who has done 500 mitral valve repair operations. Then that patient has a better chance to have correct operation performed. A lot of doctors know each other's records of clinical outcomes (results of surgery). Dr. Lawrence H. Cohn, MD. On the other hand, there are databases that are being generated around our country. They have clinical outcomes data for individual surgeons and hospitals. These databases are going to have clinical outcomes data (surgery results) eventually. Dr. Anton Titov, MD. How to choose a surgeon? Best surgeons work faster and have fewer complications. How to choose a cardiac surgeon and where to go for heart valve surgery?