Have you been thinking about what specialty is right for you? Considering EM, but concerned about the lifestyle? In this episode of Med Student Over Easy, Patricia and Kaitlin are joined by EM Over Easy hosts, John Casey and Tanner Gronowski to discuss the lifestyle of an EM physician.
Academic vs Community Medicine:
Academic:
- Often working with residents and students, which may require some work offline when not on clinical shits
- Weekly didactics with residents keep you accountable for staying up on the literature as an attending.
- Usually working alongside other EM doctors, which gives the feel of more commodore Usually there with someone else, more camaraderie
- Typically not as much downtime a big academic center as in a rural community setting.
Community:
- Often working with fewer doctors at the same time.
- There is less accountability to stay current.
- Often slower-paced.
Shift-Work:
- “When I’m on, I’m on and when I’m off, I’m off.”
- This can be both a pro and a con because when you’re on, you’re on for the whole group and you can’t just leave in an emergency without making sure someone is there to cover for you.
- But when you are off, you aren’t generally having to deal with work at home.
- Shift work makes scheduling fairly flexible.
- You can work nights and be with family during the day.
- In some groups, you can work part-time and still get benefits.
- If you have a non-negotiable, you can often work around it depending on the group.
Holidays/Weekends
- “I no longer have holidays and weekends, I have days on and days off.”
- The easiest way to approach this with family, friends, and significant others is to set expectations early on by teaching them that there are some important things that you are going to miss, but there will also be times that you will be able to be there when others can’t be.
- Traveling, shopping, and scheduling appointments are often cheaper and easier because we are often free during the week.
Take-Home Points:
- EM is so Don’t think that whatever EM lifestyle you are exposed to is the one that everyone has. There are so many versions of EM.
- Look at what you want residency to look like, but also look at what you want life to look like beyond that.
- “The A-fib of specialties.” The most predictably unpredictable specialty. We know when we’re on months in advance, but our shifts are unpredictable.
Post by Patricia Capone, DO PGY3
References:
- https://medschoolinsiders.com/medical-student/so-you-want-to-be-an-emergency-medicine-doctor/
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9955602/
- https://www.emra.org/books/msadvisingguide/choosing-emergency-medicine
- https://www.aliem.com/20-tips-career-success-emergency-medicine/
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