Dr. Bedabrata Sarkar, MD

Four surgeries- pipe plugging, first repacking (failed), repacking (post 11 d on ventilator, successful), de-adhesion (complication). Lucky to have Dr. Sarkar- took charge of unusual case that could have gone either way.

I was shot 6 times in my sleep. I was in & out of the hospital for 4 months. Dr. Sarkar was the best doctor I could have do my surgeries. He called me personally on his vacation to make sure I was doing well. I had 2 colostomy reversals & he had also had his plastic surgeons remove some extra fat. We joked, we cried, & most of we survived it all. I say we cause he made sure I was back to normal. I cant thank ALL my Trama team enough. 5 star doctor & I would recommend him to anyone!

I saw Dr. Sarkar in the Emergency Room during his residency in Ann Arbor. He was treating my father, who it seemed at the time might not make it through the night. Dr. Sarkar's behavior was so extreme -- pompous, no regard for the emotional side of family members, and seemingly condescending -- that one of the other doctors pulled me aside to say "He's really an excellent doctor." I put my father's life at risk to wait until the next shift came on, just to avoid Dr. Sarkar's manner, which basically told me my father would die either quickly or slowly (punch line: he didn't, and lived quite a long time beyond that evening). I dealt with nearly 100 doctors during my father's treatment, and only one was similar to Dr. Sarkar. I believe he is an excellent clinician. But he needs to work a whole lot on his bedside manner.

Dr. Sarkar was on duty the night my father was admitted with extreme pains in his abdomen, and had an apparent blockage, which was life-threatening. He was 75, and I'd interacted with literally dozens, if not hundreds, of people in the medical profession before. Dr. Sarkar stands out as, by a very wide margin, the least pleasant, almost to the point of pathology. He informed me that I had two choices: operate, which my father would likely not survive, or do nothing, in which case his colon would likely explode, and he would die painfully and slowly. He literally gave me five minutes to decide. This was "out of nowhere". One of the other residents even pulled me over to say "Dr. Sarkar is an excellent physician, but sometimes he is a little gruff." Gruff, I have dealt with. But nothing like this. I literally put my father's life at risk to wait 15 minutes for the next hospital shift to come on, so I would not have to deal with Dr. Sarkar, who in retrospect does seem to have… something of a personality disorder. A postscript is that a patient team of physicians were able, over 24 hours, to clear the blockage, and he was fine. Fortunately, I waited. It could have meant my father's life.