Wayzata Students Get Hands-On Orthopedic Surgery Experience

For the second year in a row, a group of students from Wayzata High School received a hands-on look at orthopedic surgery.

It’s not every day that a high schooler gets to visit the operating room — or get their hands on the tools orthopedic surgeons use every day. Students recently visited the WestHealth Surgery Center in Plymouth. Doctors and health care leaders hope visits like this begin to address a looming surgeon shortage. 

“We know that there’s a big shortage of health care providers coming in the future, and we want to invest in these students so we can help with that,” said Dr. Bishoy Gad, an orthopedic surgeon with Allina Health. “I think all of us, as we get older, are going to need good doctors and nurses and other health care providers to help us. So we’re just investing in our future.”

Dr. Gad works mostly on knee and hip replacements. He said there are 800 orthopedic surgery graduates each year with 1.3 million knee and hip replacements done annually. And that’s just some sectors of orthopedic surgery. He said need is greatly outpacing supply.

He hopes this workshop will show students the work up close and teach them about the rewarding results of doing hands-on work in the medical field. He wants people to know about the other positions in health care, too, like nursing, anesthesia and physician assistant roles.

“Being a doctor, or a nurse, or any other field in medicine, you’re really helping people,” Dr. Gad said.

Dr. Gad shows students one of the tools he uses for knee surgery.

The Next Generation

The 15 students who came from Wayzata High were all recommended by their teachers. Evalyn Ngo, a junior at Wayzata, is in the CNA course.

“It’s a great opportunity to learn more about the health care field and the medical field in general, and just explore my pathways on what I’m going to do in the future,” Ngo said.

She hopes to go into dermatology, but said this visit opened her eyes to another option.

“Its just another pathway, you know? You never know if you’re going to change your mind down the road, so this has definitely become in my back pocket,” Ngo said.

Ngo got to practice sewing up a banana, and she and her classmates got to try different orthopedic surgery tools and technologies alongside providers.

“It was pretty interesting, it was pretty fun,” Ngo said.

Evalyn Ngo practices sewing up a banana.

Wayzata High School

Maple Grove | Plymouth