Rolden: So... You can be a pediatrician really... There's also Pediatric Surgery....
Pediatric surgery focuses on children that need surgical intervention for medical conditions and illnesses. Pediatric surgeons are focused on the diagnosis, preoperative, operative, and postoperative management for fetuses, infants, children, adolescents, and young adults.
Surgical problems seen by pediatric surgeons are often quite different from those commonly seen by general surgeons, therefore it is common for them to work together with other specialists that may be involved in a child's medical care (such as neonatologists, pediatricians, and family physicians) in order to decide whether surgery might be the best option.
Some medical conditions in newborns and children do not lend themselves to a good quality of life unless they are corrected surgically. Examples of necessary surgeries may be things such as: birth defects, undescended testes, hernias, hydroceles and varicoceles, liver lacerations, tumours, transplants, bronchoscopies, esophagogastroduodenoscopies, and colonoscopies.
Sub-specialties of pediatric surgery include:
Neonatal Surgery (the surgical repair of birth defects)
Fetal Surgery (working with radiologists, surgeons use ultrasound during the fetal stage to detect abnormalities)
Pediatric Urological Surgery (illness or disease of the genitals or urinary tract (kidneys, ureters, bladder)
Pediatric Hepatobiliary Surgery (gallbladder and liver disease)
Pediatric GI Surgery (appendicitis, tumors, complex problems of the esophagus, liver, pancreas, stomach, and intestines)
Pediatric Oncological Surgery (malignant tumours and benign growths)