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These threads always have lots of people jumping on doctors and their decisions/callousness/lack-of-reason/etc.etc.etc. My wife is a physician (OBGYN) at a majo
by HEmanZ 4y ago
These threads always have lots of people jumping on doctors and their decisions/callousness/lack-of-reason/etc.etc.etc. My wife is a physician (OBGYN) at a major city hospital that primarily serves a very poor population. I'd like to share her schedule, and see if you think what kind of care you could perform under these circumstances:
Monday - Friday
- Wake up at 4:30 AM
- Get to hospital by 5AM to start rounding on patients
- Sometimes work inpatient all day sometimes clinic thrown in, but usually not done working until 7 PM, without even a 15 min break or a chance to eat a meal (15 hour day)
- Come home and do about an hour of notes
- At least once per week, wake up in the middle of the night to deliver a patient who asked for that kind of continuity of care.
Saturday:
- Wake up around 5am to be in by 6am to start the day
- Work inpatient, usually without time for a 15min break for food, until 10AM SUNDAY (28 hours shift)
Repeat 49 weeks/year (days of 24/hr shift can vary and she usually gets one weekend off/month). Her average time at the hospital last year was 96 hours/week.
How much confidence do you have that you'd be able to take care of a complicated pregnancy at the end of a 28 hour shift, having not eaten for more than 24 hours, having 10 other patients on your mind, and having had only a couple of hours sleep the night before? It's no wonder to me anymore to me birth outcomes are so bad in understaffed hospitals in poor areas...
- thfuran 4y agoThat sounds illegal.
- chips_n_fries 4y agoAnd she is not a resident or in a training/certification program?
- HEmanZ 4y agoNot anymore, but she’s only two years out. Her hours are actually worse than most of residency these last two years.
- jmt_ 4y agoIt's kind of amazing anyone chooses to go into healthcare having to work like this. It's the absolute last field I would ever want to go into, even as an engineer who wouldn't need to actually practice medicine. Seems like you need to practically give up your life to save countless others. Your wife, and those like her, are truly performing an innately critical job at an absurd cost to themselves - God bless.
- jmcgough 4y agoIt depends a lot on the specialty. Obgyn is particularly hellish. But yeah, there's a good reason why suicide rates are so high for doctors...
- rednerrus 4y agoThe AAMC should increase the number of students they admit. The average medical school is turning away 95% of applicants. The top 10 schools in America are excepting <2.5%.
- late2part 4y agoexcepting?
- rednerrus 4y agoGoofed that one up... Accepting
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- cfu28 4y agoDoing this would make the problem worse by increasing the amount of unemployable newly graduated doctors that can't practice because they can't match into a residency program. Medical schools have exploded in number the past few decades compared to the actual amount of residency spots that have been opened. The limiting factor isn't medical school admissions, it's residency spots. We'd need to increase medicare funding if we want more residency spots.
- triceratops 4y agoWhy does medicare alone have to fund residency spots?
- cfu28 4y agoConceptually, I'd agree with you. I don't think medicare alone needs to fund residency spots (its just currently tied to the amount of spots last I checked). I'm more concerned about the total number of residency spots.
- gus_massa 4y agoThat is insane. For some reason, airplane pilots have very strict rules about how long they can be in the cabin, how much they must rest, and similar stuff. (Also, they have checklists, plenty of checklist, but medical doctors don't like checklists.) Even bus and truck drivers have a more sane maximal shifts restrictions.