totally agree
plus
- many patients die and personally I could not handle it, basically you just tell them about size of the tumor and approximate date of the death
- I think neurosurgeons always experience some kind of guilt (they cut neurones and destroy personalities), IMO that is why cover-page of the Neurosurgery magazine always has picture of classic, sophisticated paintings (defence mechanism I think - to cover still barbarian nature of their work )
- neurosurgeons live in hospitals not with their families
but at the same time they saved my father (huge meningeoma- 9 hours surgery - 11 years ago)
so I think it is not about scores, earning or competitiveness
it is about VOCATION and LOVE for that specialty