Introduction:

Professional improvement in general surgeons, particularly in preoperative care, is a way to increase permanent or continuous education, which contributes to the creation of men of science with certain values and attitudes.

Objective:

To design an upgrading strategy for the development of professional skills in preoperative care that contributes to the improvement of professional performance in general surgeons.

Methods:

As theoretical methods, analysis-synthesis was used, together with the historical-logical method, systematization, induction-deduction, modeling, documentary analysis, and the structural-functional-systemic method; while, at the empirical level, scientific observation was used.

Results:

The design of the strategy responded to the development of professional skills in preoperative mediated care and was based on philosophical, sociological, psychological, epistemological, pedagogical and medical education referents. It was conceived in four stages and used the Deming cycle, which establishes essential relationships with internal logical coherence to medical education, particularly in the area of permanent and continuous education for health professionals.

Conclusions:

The design of the professional strategy allows the enrichment of medical education sciences from the postgraduate level as a science under construction, specifically in the area of permanent and continuous training of general surgeons. Insofar it deepens from the internal, external and contextual levels for the development of professional skills in the mediate preoperative period, the proposed strategy is dynamic, allowing for the improvement of professional performance from the point of view of self-upgrading.