Behind the Knife

A US-based surgical education podcast running since 2015, created by Dr Kevin Kniery, Dr Scott Steele, Dr Jason Bingham, and Dr John McClellan. It covers surgical training, procedures, clinical updates, and interviews with surgical experts across various specialties.

April 16, 2026

Rigged or Right? The Residency Match Under Fire

Training reform rather than bedside care is the focus here. It separates the Match algorithm from pay, mistreatment, mobility, and workforce problems, without treating abolishing the Match as an automatic fix.

April 15, 2026

Behind the Mask of Shame Part 3 - Internalized Shame and Burnout

Internalised shame matters even when nobody has openly humiliated the trainee. This follow-on episode is best opened after the earlier shame discussion, because it shows how self-blame after criticism or complications links with burnout and why mentorship and debriefing matter.

April 15, 2026

Behind the Mask of Shame Part 2 - Grit, Shame, and Burnout

Humiliating feedback is separated clearly from firm correction of unsafe care. The useful point is not wellness language but teaching behaviour: name the safety issue, keep the trainee’s character out of it, and notice how shame, burnout, isolation, and suicidal thoughts can follow.

April 14, 2026

Behind the Mask of Shame Part 1 - The Background

Shame is approached as a clinical and training problem, not just a personal feeling. The episode helps explain why silence, defensiveness, perfectionism, or overwork may follow errors or feedback, and why private behaviour-focused conversations protect learning better than public criticism.

April 10, 2026

Artificial Intelligence for the Clinician Episode 5: Are Radiologists Out of a Job?

Breast screening AI only matters clinically if it reduces interval cancers or catches aggressive disease, not just if it increases detections. The episode keeps attention on radiologist workload and automation bias, which makes it useful when someone claims software can safely replace readers.

April 6, 2026

Journal Review in Thoracic Surgery: VV ECMO in Pre-Lung Transplant Patients - A Bridge to Somewhere

The reason not to reassure is that VV ECMO only helps if it is still a bridge to transplant. This episode is most useful when a listed patient worsens, because it focuses on awake ECMO, ambulation, candidacy review and knowing when support has lost its destination.

April 3, 2026

Mastering M&M: A Practical Guide to Presenting Complications

The pitfall is turning an M&M case into a discharge summary and burying the complication. Worth opening for its practical rules on one-sentence headlines, clean timelines, decision points, and no-blame analysis of post-operative haemorrhage or anastomotic leak.

March 30, 2026

Clinical Challenges in Transplant Surgery: How Xenotransplantation Will Change Our Lives

The reason to open this one is not science fiction but scarcity. It explains why pigs became preferred donors, how alpha-gal and gene editing shaped progress, and where xenografts may realistically sit as bridge therapy for severe organ failure rather than routine replacement.

March 27, 2026

OBGYN Oral Board Review - Sample Episode: Adnexal Emergency

Acute pelvic pain needs early separation of tubo-ovarian abscess from ovarian torsion. Exclude ectopic pregnancy first, use ultrasound as first-line imaging, but do not let preserved Doppler flow or a normal white cell count delay urgent laparoscopy or drainage when the clinical pattern remains high risk.

March 26, 2026

The Prelim Playbook: Tips, Tricks, and Unspoken Rules for Success

After an unsuccessful categorical surgery match, choose a prelim year only if clinical performance or local proof of ability is the real gap. Ask for specific feedback early, secure directly observed letters, and avoid reflexing into research when the limiting factor is elsewhere.

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