It really is brain surgery: How Dr. Carter found his calling

The patient is asleep, lying face down on an operating table in OR2 at the University of Utah’s Clinical Neurosciences Center, surrounded by a dozen people who do their jobs with swift efficiency, whether monitoring vital signs or guiding an implement to peel away scar tissue or regulating the cocktail of medication that keeps the patient under.

The overhead lights switch from white to green as the operation progresses, a single white light outlining only the area where the brain is exposed. Everything else by design fades into the green background.

For the next several hours, the neurosurgeon and his team focus solely on the patient’s well-being, removing a tumor that’s small but will grow dangerously if it’s left alone.

This is not the patient’s first brain surgery. They are removing