Counter Steven F MD Surgery

Who isn’t nervous going into surgery? I was lucky to have had Dr Counter as my surgeon. I had complete trust in him. Nice guy, easy to talk to, good sense of humor
and stellar reputation. Good listener & educator. What a difference it made to have a doc who was such a pleasure to work with.

Need a big, complex abdominal surgery? This is the guy!
After almost eight years that included five major abdominal surgeries for a variety of issues all related to my colon removal in 2005, my abdomen is back to near normal thanks to the talent and expertise of Dr. Counter at Seattle’s Polyclinic. The complex abdominal reconstruction took Dr. Counter and his team at Swedish a little over four hours on January 22, 2013. Because an emergent abdominal surgery (by other surgeons) unfortunately split apart and became infected in April 2012 I spent the last 10 months with an «open abdomen» left to heal by «secondary intention» (on its own), a procedure sometimes referred to a a «planned ventral hernia». The whole process that began last April included three weeks in the hospital, 3 day-​a-​week visits to the Swedish Wound Healing Center to service a portable «Wound Vac» necessary to facilitate healing and decrease the chance of infection in my open abdomen. After the wound vac I learned to change my own dressing with weekly assistance from the wound healing center.
From the outset Dr. Counter never minimized the difficult and complexity of this type of surgery. He described in detail how he would approach the «project» including the risks with a caring but decisive attitude and made me confident that I had chosen the right surgeon for the procedure. He kept me and my wife in the loop every step of the way and post-​op has been more than attentive to my recovery. The previous reviewer last year put it best — which is still true, «He listens, he explains, he jokes, he cares, he knows!»