Coaching, panic, and the arrival fallacy: a surgery chat with Mel Thacker, MD

What happens when you become the surgeon, pay off the loans, and still feel empty?

On Cut & Tell’s first guest episode, Dr. Mel Thacker (ENT, surgeon coach, and host of Surgeons with Purpose) joins me to talk about her new memoir, Scrubbing In. It covers her path from childhood neglect to surgery, the arrival fallacy, and the panic attacks in the OR that finally forced her to face it all.

We also get into how insurance incentives quietly shape clinical decisions, why Mel walked away from private practice, why residency needs coaching, and how she built a part-time locums career on her own terms.

📚 Referenced: Scrubbing In: A Surgeon’s Journey from Self-Doubt to Wholeness by Dr. Mel Thacker; “When Incentives Become Instinct” (Hippocratic Collective); The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek

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Host: Liz Malphrus, MD

Connect with Liz: https://www.hippocratic-collective.com/members/liz-malphrus-md

IG: @dr.malphrus

Produced By: The Hippocratic Collective

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