Trauma surgeon and healthcare leader Dr. Scott Ellner joins me to talk about the moments that reshaped his life and career, from witnessing a beachside intubation at age 21 to navigating one of the lowest points of his surgical practice. We explore complications, shame, psychological safety in the OR, and why compassion and emotional intelligence are essential (not optional) in surgery.

Scott shares the retained foreign body case that transformed his approach to leadership, the danger of tense OR energy, and the difference between title-based authority and referent power. We also discuss the failure of punitive peer review, the legacy of Ernest Codman, and what it really takes for surgeons to regain confidence after early-career mistakes.

We each open up about panic attacks—mine recently in the OR, his in medical school—and talk about vulnerability, preparation, and staying ahead of fear. Scott also previews his upcoming book, Wipe Out Rise Up, a blend of surgical stories and lessons from surfing on resilience, perseverance, and facing storms head-on.

Find Scott and his book here.

Listen to his TEDx talk "Lessons from Surgery and Grey's Anatomy" here.

Join Empowered Surgeons Group here.

Get the pre-or mindset checklist here.

Join us in Empowered Surgeons Group here.

Anxiety can be transformed into resilience and courage, but only when we move toward it, not away from it.

Anxiety is the life-saving fear response misapplied to the imagination.

By definition, anxiety is a lie.

What we fear—killing the patient, facing a lawsuit, losing our reputation, losing everything—is not actually happening in real time.

Fear is intuitive, primitive, and immediately actionable. It comes in a wave, then recedes.

Anxiety, on the other hand, never relents.

• Fight
• Flight
• Freeze
• Fawn
• Flop

When we close a loop with fight or flight, our brain registers safety and completion.

But when we respond with freeze, fawn, or flop, the event can encode as trauma.

That’s why exercising healthy fight—asserting boundaries instead of people-pleasing—is essential.

In the hierarchical culture of surgical training, this can be especially hard to do.

Notice the thoughts your brain offers, often disguised as innocent questions:

Instead of accepting that thought as truth, offer the opposite:

Then, shift into a mental state that serves you. I like to remind myself:

Finally, create a short ritual, like visualizing the entire case from start to finish at the scrub sink.

When anxiety hits—bleeding, getting lost in a dissection, uncertainty—let the physiologic surge pass through your system for 90 seconds.

Do not believe the story your brain tells you during those 90 seconds.

Once the wave subsides, find certainty:

Then move from known to unknown with curiosity and creativity.

Download your thoughts.

Speak them into a voice memo or write them down unedited, unfiltered, stream-of-consciousness.

Getting it out of your head helps you process, release, and reset for the next case.

Key takeaway:

Anxiety isn’t the enemy; it’s an invitation.

When you learn to meet it directly, you transform it into the fuel for courage, clarity, and growth.

In this episode, digital marketer Colin Royal—husband to ENT surgeon and fellow Hippocratic Collective co-founder Dr. Frances Mei Hardin—joins the show to discuss everything we didn’t learn about how industries outside of surgery work.

In surgical culture, we often carry false notions, like the idea that we should give our time, energy, and value away for free (see Episode #4: Toxic Martyrdom).

The truth is: we aren't exempt from the rules of business. Businesses need money for sustainability, and money comes from value.

As surgeons, we have a lot of value to give the world.

We give value to our patients when we hold space for them in clinic and offer our expertise. We give value in the operating room when we use our skills to help fix their problems. We give value to our communities by taking call. We give value every time we answer phone calls and messages.

These are all value points, and we’re not wrong or bad for monetizing them. Every other industry does. That’s how a profession becomes sustainable: the more value you offer, the more people want to pay to receive it. The more resourced and protected you are as the ASSET, the more capacity you have to give your value for free…when you want to. Giving value away for free isn’t bad in and of itself, but when a system or culture forces us to martyr ourselves against our will, that’s a recipe for burnout and implosion.

When we begin to understand how the world outside of surgery works, we open the door to diversifying our identity. We start to feel comfortable with the idea of multiple income streams. We stop telling ourselves that we’re special snowflakes with no discernible skills beyond surgery. We can learn marketing, selling, and social media just as well as the next person.

The sooner you learn these lessons, the sooner you release yourself from your self-appointed shackles and the sooner you create freedom to evolve with your career. You deserve to be compensated for the immense value you offer the world. And you get to give value away for free on your terms.

If this resonates, you are going to want to follow The Hippocratic Collective here. If you have an idea you want to share with the world, HC can bring that idea to life. If you are a woman surgeon interested in the Cabo retreat, get on my calendar here. You can learn more about Empowered Surgeons Group here.

******SENSITIVE CONTENT WARNING*********

This episode discusses child abuse, religious trauma, depression, moral injury, and pediatric violent trauma. Please listen carefully.

Pediatric surgeon Dr. Jose Greenspon shares an unflinching account of practicing at one of the busiest trauma centers in the country, shouldering all of the work after his partners resigned, all while his own faith, family, and mental health unraveled. He speaks candidly about stigma in surgery, moral injury, being labeled “disruptive” when asking for help, and the moment a sensory trigger in the OR surfaced a childhood assault by a rabbi. This conversation is about the cost of carrying more than one human can hold, and the courage to put the burden down.

If this episode resonates with you, and you'd like to reach out to Dr. Greenspon, email him at [email protected]

In this episode we discuss:

• Dealing with life-and-death without a vent partner: Pediatric penetrating trauma is difficult enough; facing it without support is punishing. Dr. Greenspon recognized the essential need for a trusted peer or space to unburden the experiences surgeons carry.
• Faith in crisis: As an Orthodox Jewish man, he struggled to find God in the chaos—then a flashback to childhood molestation shattered what remained of his religious safety net and contributed to the end of his marriage.
• The breaking point: A child his daughter’s age died from a gunshot wound to the chest. A smell in the OR triggered a panic attack and a vivid flashback. He finished the case, then self-reported to the CMO.
• Stigma and moral injury: Seeking help led to being labeled rather than supported. “You martyr yourself, and it gets weaponized against you.”
• Choosing to leave: Why leaving a toxic job and facing his demons was the best decision, and how outstanding residents became close friends.
• “Parent whisperer”: How he builds trust with families, honors the gravity of every operation, and treats residents with radical humility: “The only difference between me and you is that I happen to come first.”
• Work as a vice: How unprocessed trauma can morph into work addiction, guilt, and a compulsion to protect children—plus what recovery looks like now with a therapist who understands religious abuse.
• System reflections: On toxic competitiveness in pediatric surgery, administrative incentives, and what true appreciation and backup should look like.

RAINN (U.S.) — National Sexual Assault Hotline: 800-656-HOPE (4673) | rainn.org

988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (U.S.) — Call or text 988 | 988lifeline.org

Physician Support Line (U.S.) — 1-888-409-0141 | physiciansupportline.com

• If this conversation resonated, share it with a colleague.
• Subscribe to Surgeons With Purpose and leave a review to help other surgeons find the show.
• For coaching and community: Empowered Surgeons Group—tools, calls, and connection for surgeons navigating moral injury, complications, and career inflection points.

Thank you, Dr. Greenspon, for the honesty and heart you brought to this episode.

Click here to join Empowered Surgeons Group.

On today's episode, enjoy the replay of the webinar, "From Imposter to Integrated: Reclaiming Humanity and Authenticity in Surgery".

You can access all webinar replays inside the Empowered Surgeons Group member portal. Looking forward to seeing you inside the group!

Click here to get on my calendar for a 15 min interview for the Cabo retreat. Women surgeons only.

Click here to learn more about Empowered Surgeons Group.

It's back-to-back Chrissy(ie) episodes! Dr. Chrissy Guidry is a trauma and critical care surgeon and founder of Whole Body Optimism, a program designed to empower busy healthcare professionals find integrity of mind, physical body, and soul by implementing practical intentional practices into their everyday lives.

In this conversation, we explore Dr. Chrissy's journey through academic medicine, infertility, and institutional betrayal, and how it all led to a deeper integration of mind, body, heart, and soul.

After seven and a half years at Tulane, she found herself at a crossroads. While navigating marriage and fertility treatments, she faced the harsh reality of how academia often punishes physicians for being human. What began as an ultrasound appointment became a weapon used against her and a defining moment in reclaiming her integrity and purpose.

• Surgeon Purpose Check: Who are we really doing this for: ourselves or the patients?
• Coaching as Catalyst: How hiring a coach for the department transformed the culture for everyone.
• Fertility and Academia: The tension between starting a family and the unspoken expectations of academic productivity.
• Integrity in Healing: How her fertility journey sparked a whole-self integration of mind, body, heart, and soul.
• Becoming the Medical Education Wellness Director at Tulane
• Creating wellness champions across departments
• Using GME funding to host interdisciplinary networking events
• Developing an app to centralize well-being resources for residents
• Expanding the Mission Online: How she brought physician wellness work to the digital space, helping clinicians worldwide prioritize their humanity.
• Mindset Over Strategy: Why happiness isn’t a moving target; it’s a mindset shift.

Key Reframes for Resilience:

• We are human beings, not human doings
• Life doesn't just have to happen to you; it can happen for you.

1. How can I take more responsibility for the outcome?
2. How can I grow from this opportunity?
3. What good is already present in this challenge?

Interested in Empowered Surgeons Group? Click here.

In today's episode, Dr. Chrissie Ott and I sit down to discuss my journey.

In this episode, you’ll learn

• How panic, insomnia, and “I must be broken” thoughts can be early sirens of burnout—and what healing looked like for me.
• The Drama Triangle (victim–hero–villain) vs. David Emerald’s Empowerment Dynamic (creator–coach–challenger), with real clinical scenarios
• Why the “healthcare hero” narrative can unintentionally disempower patients
• Fiduciary ethics in the exam room: naming incentives, protecting integrity, and keeping decisions in the patient’s hands
• Why creation must be “for you first”
• What agency looks like in career evolution: closing one chapter so another can fully begin
• How to transmute suffering into service without bypassing the hard parts
• The vision of the Hippocratic Collective: every physician’s voice belongs

Dr. Chrissie Ott is a physician, coach and host of Solving for Joy Podcast.

Find her on instagram here.

Follow me on instagram here.

Join Empowered Surgeons Group here.

In surgery, it's tempting to attach our identity to surgical outcomes. But what result does that create? Because complications are inevitable, patients are unpredictable, and surgeons are human--and fallible, the result of grasping onto perfection is always the same: suffering.

If we instead define failure as simply failure to serve, we create freedom for ourselves. Our focus shifts from trying to control the uncontrollable to setting a clear intention: service. In that reality, we reclaim agency and purpose no matter the outcome.

Are you a woman surgeon interested in our Cabo retreat? Click here before we fill our cohort!

Today I’m talking with financial activist, author, and viral TEDx speaker Mel Dorman about how to create wealth in a way that’s simple, sustainable, and rooted in community. This conversation will stick with you long after you listen.

Watch their TEDx talk [here], grab their book [here], and explore the Seller Finance Academy [here].

Ready to join Empowered Surgeons? Click here.

Women Surgeons interested in the Self-Concept Weekend in Cabo, click here to schedule a 15 min interview with me.

In this episode, my guest, Dr. Priya Kothapalli, and I discuss the beauty and power of intuition, the challenges of corporate medicine, imposter syndrome, don't know mind, and what it's like to have the courage to design a life true to oneself.

Priya Kothapalli, MD, is a coronary and structural heart disease interventional cardiologist based in the Dallas Fort Worth area, model, yogi, and host of the Open Heart podcast.

Follow Priya on instagram here. Follow her podcast, which debuts this fall, here.

Join Empowered Surgeons Group here.

Check out Hippocratic Collective here.