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Be able, available, and especially affable if you want team success.

Recognizing that the best anesthesiologists display outstanding clinical traits; (not in order of priority) being able (knowledgeable, skilled, i.e., competent) and available (whenever anesthesia patient care is required) are obvious. What about affable? Do we mean being able to tell the best quips? Hardly! What do we mean by affable and why is this a trait that anesthesiologists must internalize and actualize in their daily activities? A first cut at the answer to the question, “Do anesthesiologists need to be affable?” is the obvious acknowledgment that we need to get along with our surgical colleagues. Robert Dunning Dripps, M.D. (1911– 1973, Professor and Chair, Department of Anesthesia, The University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania), the first Chair of Anesthesia at The University of Pennsylvania knew how important it was to have a positive relationship with these colleagues when, in 1943, an Anesthesiology Department, separate from control by the Surgery Faculty, came into existence with the support of surgeon Isadore S. Ravdin, M.D. (1894–1972, Surgeon-in-Chief at the Hospital of The University of Pennsylvania and the John Rhea Barton Professor of Surgery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).* Dripps was successful because he was affable with surgeons like Ravdin. Edwards and Waisel in their Special Article, “49 Mathoura Road: Geoffrey Kaye’s Letters to Paul Wood, 1939–1955”1 provide a second and perhaps less obvious answer to the question, “Do anesthesiologists need to be affable?” In this recounting of the influence Geoffrey Kaye, M.B.B.S., had on the development of Anesthesiology in Australia, Edwards and Waisel offer primary source documentation of Kaye’s unfortunate failure and eventual alienation from those he wished most to help. Intent on developing an educational resource center, Kaye singlehandedly planned and implemented 49 Mathoura Road, intending it to become the focal point for his anesthesiology colleagues to meet, discuss, learn, and grow their newly emerging specialty as a distinct physician discipline with clinical, scientific, and educational bases. Reading Kaye’s letters reveals that he went all in on his idea, investing his personal fortune to accomplish his vision. What he discovered, however, was that he was not only out in front, but when he turned around and looked, his Australian anesthetic colleagues were not behind him; he was all by himself. Although Kaye was well regarded by the American and European anesthesiology peers with whom he visited and corresponded and whose accomplishments he sought to emulate, he did not find Australian contemporaries sharing his vision. Kaye’s failure is in stark contrast to others’ successes. Paul Wood, M.D. (1894–1963, Founder, Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology), Kaye’s correspondent described by Edwards and Waisel, immediately comes to mind. Other mentors and professional colleagues of Kaye’s, Ralph Waters, M.D. (1883– 1979, Professor and Chair, Department of Anesthesiology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin), Francis H. McMechan, M.D. (1879–1939, Founder of Current Researches in Anesthesia and Analgesia, which eventually became Anesthesia & Analgesia), and Elmer I. McKesson, M.D. (1881–1935, Inventor of Anesthesia Equipment and Authority on Nitrous Be Able, Available, and Especially Affable if You Want Team Success