15. Dr. Jo Hannafin: Building Teams in Medicine - Part II

We’re going to continue our discussion with Dr. Jo Hannafin and focus on building teams within clinical research as well as within the OR.

We start off this episode with an article from the April 2021 edition of General Orthopaedics entitled Orthopaedic Clinical Research: Building a Team that Lasts by Laura Stiegel and her team. The authors discuss the importance of having a diverse team, paying attention to time management and flexibility, as well as the need to establish a culture that promotes team member longevity and commitment to productivity. Dr. Hannafin was the first Clinician-Scientist at the Hospital for Special Surgery and maintained an active research program in the area of ligament physiology for over 20 years. We are grateful to hear her perspective on building programs with sustainability. 

Finally, we dive into the topic of surgical teams. The Annals of Thoracic Surgery published the article Effective Leadership of Surgical Teams: A Mixed Methods Study of Surgeon Behaviors and Functions. Dr. Sara Singer, of the Harvard School of Public Health, and her colleagues observed, surveyed, and interviewed cardiac surgical teams including 7 surgeons and 116 team members. Among survey responses, surgical staff evaluated the performance of surgeons as team leaders as 5.4 of 7, ranging from 4.2 for the lowest rated surgeon to 6.2 for the highest rated surgeon. The authors provide concrete behavioral strategies that surgeons can use to improve team performance, in particular increasing engagement of team members in perioperative tasks.