What Is the Training in Neurosurgery All About? Lessons Learned from Japanese Culture

Abstract

Is training in neurosurgery different from that in other medical specialties, in other professions, or in different countries? In this chapter, the characteristics of neurosurgical training and practice are described based on my personal experience with residency training and practice in neurosurgery in both the United States and Japan. We will then consider how these experiences might be said to be reflected in the philosophy and code of training of Japanese traditional culture, sports, samurai life, and Noh plays. First, “Body, Skills, Mind” (Shin-Gi-Tai in Japanese) as practiced in traditional sports like Judo and Sumo is compared with the thinking of Japanese neurosurgeons; Bushido, as described by Inazo Nitobe, is then introduced; and finally the playwright Zeami’s “Spirit of the Noh Play” is compared with the training of neurosurgeons according to aging. Technical training may be more or less uniform around the world, but the philosophical aspects of training may differ in different countries with different traditions and history.