General Surgery Consent Form: Fill & Download for Free

Generally speaking, the consent form you sign to allow the surgery is quite specific about what is to be done. If they do more and there’s a bad outcome, you would be free to sue them for it and would most likely prevail in court. But there can also be good outcomes for which you ought to be appreciative.I assume we’re not talking of reconstructive or discretionary surgery that really doesn’t need to be done.I went in for gastric surgery and asked my surgeon to excise a suspicious mole on my forearm that I had been watching grow for several months. The doctors at work all opined it was nothing. I didn’t agree. I thought this was the perfect time to remove it and have a pathologist verify whatever it was, benign or not. I made sure the excision was on the consent form, if for no other reason to make sure it wasn’t forgotten.When I woke up, my surgery was done, and also an umbilical hernia that hadn’t even been discussed had been repaired. Since my insurance company was paying for the original gastric surgery, the hernia repair was free. The excision was free too, and it showed my mole to be cancerous!So even though my surgeon did more than he was authorized to do, I’d have to have been a total asshole to complain about my free hernia repair. As it was, I was thrilled by his actions and highly appreciative.You have to accept that whenever a surgeon goes beyond the scope of the consent form, it’s in your interest; not his. Leave him some latitude to take advantage of the fact that you’re already there in the OR and under anesthesia.

I honestly couldn’t tell you whether or not my surgeon discussed a catheter for my surgery, in the same way I’m not completely sure it was discussed that I would be intubated. When I woke up with a sore throat, I immediately felt stupid for not seeing that coming as I understand full well how general anesthesia works. But I’m not sure it was expressly stated.That being said, they also didn’t go through the surgery cut by cut either. I was given a general overview of how it works, what to expect, and the potential risks and complications (along with their relative likelihood). The idea is that you’re given information about the surgery and I do believe there’s an area of the consent form including interventions that are medically necessary. It isn’t a requirement to preapprove every single medication that’s provided. It isn’t necessary to approve every single individual piece of equipment used during the surgery.No, I don’t consider it a violation of informed consent to not include a separate consent form for a urinary catheter, because I would consider it part and parcel with necessary medical interventions, just like the intubation for anesthesia. However, I guess if it would have changed your mind about having surgery, you ought to bring it up.

Disclaimer: I'm not an idiot. I promise. Sometimes I just don't think about things, especially when I was younger and still felt immortal.This was about 7 years ago when I had my eye surgery (similar to Lasik). A few minutes before I went into the room, they handed me a consent form which laid out the possible side effects and complications of my surgery. One of them was that I could possibly go blind as a result. It scared the crap out of me.Suddenly, I had the realization that anything could go wrong at any point in time (during the surgery, driving a car, walking in the street-anything) and I could get hurt and the doctors may not be able to “put me back together” so to speak. If I was hurt, I might not go back to being 100%. It scared me quite a bit, and caused me to be a much more cautious person in general.The second most scary thought was in class this last semester. (Quality Improvement in Healthcare.) The topic was consent forms and we were discussing complications and side effects. The teacher asked us if we knew the one complication that EVERY single medical procedure had in common. I was really confused, I mean what possible complication could getying a finger prick for checking your iron, getting a broken bone set amd having heart transplant surgery all have in common?The answer? Death.I was floored and suddenly realized, yes, there was always a chance that something could go horribly wrong during any medical procedure and you could die!TL:DR I realized my own mortality.Just to clarify, I had never consciously considered myself immortal, but I also never consciously considered myself mortal either.