title: "The Actualized Neurosurgeon": A Proposed Model of Surgical Resident Development.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Modern neurosurgical training is both physically and emotionally demanding, posing significant challenges, new and old, to residents as well as programs attempting to train safe, competent surgeons. Models to describe resident development, such as the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education competencies and milestones, address the acquisition of specific skills but largely ignore the stresses and pressures unique to each stage of resident training.
  
  
  METHODS
  We propose an alternative model of resident development adapted from the developmental psychology literature.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Our model identifies the challenges that must be met at each stage of junior, intermediate, and senior and chief residency, leading ultimately to an "actualized" neurosurgeon (i.e., one who has maximized his or her potential). Failure to overcome any 1 of these challenges can lead to specific long-lasting consequences, including regret, identity crisis, incompetence, and bitterness. In contrast, the actualized surgeon is one who has successfully acquired the virtues of hope, will, purpose, fidelity, productivity, leadership, competence, and wisdom. The actualized surgeon not only functions safely, confidently, and professionally, but also successfully navigates the challenges of residency and emerges from them having fulfilled his or her maximal potential.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This developmental perspective provides an individualized description of healthy surgical development. Our model allows programs to identify the basis for residents who fail to progress, counsel residents during their training, and perhaps help identify resident candidates who are better prepared to meet the developmental challenges of residency training.
authors.affiliation: Division of Neurosurgery, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Department of Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Electronic address: Nir.lipsman@utoronto.ca.
authors.forename: Nir
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Lipsman
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurological Surgery, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois, USA.
authors.forename: Osaama
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Khan
authors.affiliation: Division of Neurosurgery, Hospital for Sick Children, Department of Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: Abhaya V
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Kulkarni
mesh_terms: D002983:Clinical Competence; D004503:Education, Medical, Graduate; D004526:Efficiency; D065026:Hope; D006801:Humans; D007396:Internship and Residency; D007857:Leadership; D017145:Models, Educational; D008960:Models, Psychological; D000069471:Neurosurgeons / Q000523:psychology*; D009493:Neurosurgery / Q000193:education*; D066233:Psychology, Developmental
keywords: Competency; Developing; Education; Residency; Surgeon; Trainee