Every scalpel I pick up today carries the weight of every sleepless night it took to earn the right to hold it.
Dr. Rahul Agarwal, MBBS, DNB (General Surgery), DrNB (Vascular Surgery) — Consultant Vascular & Endovascular Surgeon, CARE Hospitals, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad
National Doctor’s Day came and went yesterday. No party, no cake — just a quiet evening of remembering how a naive, wide-eyed medical student became the vascular surgeon writing this today. I wanted to put that reflection down somewhere permanent, for my patients, my juniors, and my own record of gratitude.
🎓 Where It All Began
MBBS feels like another lifetime and yesterday, both at once. A hostel room full of friends who are now scattered across specialities and continents. Medical terminology that felt like a foreign language in first year and became second nature by finals. None of us knew which of us would end up in the OR, the ICU, or the clinic — we just knew we were drowning in the same syllabus together, and that made it survivable.
🌙 The 36-Hour Shifts and the Sleepless Nights Before the Exams
Postgraduate entrance exams, then the super-speciality entrance after that — each one meant months of preparation stacked on already-brutal duty hours. The 36-hour shifts weren’t the exception, they were the baseline. You learn quickly that fatigue is not an excuse a patient’s artery will accept. That lesson never really leaves you.
🤝 The Trust of Our Mentors
What I remember most from training isn’t a textbook — it’s the moment a senior surgeon stepped back and let me take the lead, watching closely but letting my hands do the work. That trust is earned in small increments over years. I try to extend the same trust to the residents and juniors I work with now, because I know exactly what it meant to receive it.
🔪 The First Independent Surgery
There’s a particular silence in an OR when you realise, mid-procedure, that every decision is yours to make. I remember mine clearly — the mix of preparation and fear that resolves into focus the moment the first incision is made. Every vascular case I do today still carries a trace of that first one.
💬 The Questions Patients Ask
Nothing keeps a surgeon honest like a patient’s questions. “Will I walk normally again?” “Will this fistula really last?” “Why does this keep happening to me?” Answering these, again and again over two decades, has taught me more about medicine than any conference ever has. Patients don’t want jargon — they want someone who will sit down, explain it plainly, and mean it.
🔬 Two Decades of Change
The vascular surgery I trained in and the vascular surgery I practise today are almost different specialities. Open bypasses that once meant weeks of recovery have given way to endovascular techniques — angioplasty, stenting, minimally invasive interventions — that get patients back on their feet in days. Staying current isn’t optional in this field; it’s the job.
🏥 From a Naive Student to a Vascular Surgeon in a Tier-1 City
Today I practise as a Consultant Vascular and Endovascular Surgeon at a corporate hospital in Hyderabad — a long way from that first anxious year of medical college. Doctor’s Day, for me, isn’t about celebration. It’s about pausing long enough to acknowledge everyone who shaped that distance: mentors, colleagues, patients, and the exhaustion that built the discipline this work demands.
Key reflection: Medicine doesn’t reward talent alone — it rewards the willingness to keep showing up, sleepless night after sleepless night, until showing up becomes who you are.
About the Author
Dr. Rahul Agarwal is a Consultant Vascular and Endovascular Surgeon at CARE Hospitals, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad, with qualifications MBBS, DNB (General Surgery), DrNB (Vascular Surgery). He specialises in the diagnosis and minimally invasive treatment of peripheral artery disease, varicose veins, diabetic foot, and dialysis access.
This article reflects personal experience and is intended for general readership, not as medical advice. For any vascular health concern, please consult a qualified vascular surgeon directly.