Calling out sick????

[SLUser11]

Are these people for real?? I used the max sick days every third year and now fourth year rotation. We got 5 per rotation and I used every one of them every rotation and still honored all my third year rotations-You have to be kidding yourself if you think any busy resident notices or remmebers which days their med student was sick at the end. I usually got 5 days off each rotation-loved sick days. You guys are sucha bunch of tools-that is why medicine is looked down upon because it is filled with tools like you guys.ridiculouso

I don't throw the label "troll" around since I've been given the same title by others in the past......so I'll just label you as The best example of what I mean by "abusing the system" and being weak and lazy.

It's pretty sad that your work ethic sucks and you're going to be a doctor. It's even sadder that after searching some of your posts, you apparently go to a "top 20" med school, where you would think the old school mentality on absences would be the most pronounced....then again, I've noticed that a much larger percentage of students at some of those schools "honor," so maybe your accomplishments aren't that great.

Either way, your attitude sucks, you are WAY over-arrogant and over-impressed with yourself, and your selfish approach to work will hopefully bite you in the @ss when your co-residents in psychiatry find out how worthless you are.

Please stick to asking for love advice in the lounge.

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[caffeinefree08]

There are certain rotations in my school that you are expected to get sick. Med school legend is that you will never be sick in surgery but you will have two illnesses during peds - one respiratory and one GI.

I've been ill on my IM rotation, but I dealt with that problem by backing off on the time I spent with my patients and heading directly home w/o passing go to get extra sleep. While not any fun, I survived and I have doubts that I will call in sick unless I dramatically collapse, Grey's Anatomy style, in the OR.

Who knows, they may put me in the same room as the ER attending I know who developed a painful kidney kidney stone mid shift . He hooked himself up to an IV to wait out the night before starting his next shift. (Every once in a while a nurse would come in and have him sign a chart)

 

[brbsb]

I called in sick one day during third year rotations. I was 28 weeks pregnant and had some horrendous version of food poisoning. I lost 4 pounds in a week and pretty much could not leave the house. I called in sick mostly because I was on my peds rotation and could not justify giving our already sick little babies diarrhea. They were cool about it, I came back the next day still feeling sick but better. I think if you pose an infectious risk to your patients other than a cold, you need to stay home, and if people think that's weak it's their problem.

I realize this is off-topic, but you were pregnant as a med student? How did you manage everything? I'm just curious because I'll probably be married by the time I get to med school (I'm in college now).

 

[thewebthsp]

I'm not trusting anyone with < 100 posts

I only called in sick when I went to the ED (at an away rotation) and was told not to come in... probably was still less than ideal.

I think if you're sick enough to see the doctor or ED, you should see them and call out sick. It's quite rare (for me) to be that sick more than 2-3 X per year.

 

[Analyzethis]

This thread absolutely disgusts me-are people that self-righteous in medicine? I have worked in plenty of other fields and only the toolish personality in medicine breeds these ridiculous ideas. Have you ever actually thought of the diff between residency and medschool before you try to say that you are "training for residency" Some rotations are painful, not interesting to you and have no bearing on anything you will ever practice. During those rotations I had no interest in being there even when I was feeling completely fine. Next my work contributed nothing to the team. STudent notes did not count for a thing, did not save the interns any work etc. And by calling in you do not stick anyone with any extra work. Do you realized the POINT of medical school is to LEARN-have you never had talks from attendings and GOOD residents who say they do NOT want to scut out students because there is time for that in residency. You will learn the paperwork, busy work etc etc in residency soon enough. 3rd and 4th year are for learning primarly. Going in feeling sick as a dog and not being able to think clearly is useless-you are not going to learn a thing-no youll just struggle through the day to scrape together a note or 2 that does not matter and will not even take anything away form the day because your sick.

In residency-you are (hopefully) in the field you love/like and enjoy for one. Second you are important and have responsiblity. Third you owe it to your peers and colleagues to not load them up with work. All those things are pretty motivating for most people, enough so that they will not call in unless absoultely necessary. Howeer none of these motivating factors exist in medschool. The person said that these are "bad habits" is a fool-knowing when your services are useless and when they are needed is a skill in itself and is called being efficient and intelligent about your time.

I dont even want to type more-you guys are just so ridiculous-I see tons of you in the hospital all the time-the funny thing is we will all get to the same place-get to the field we love-You guys are just bitter that you had to go through more hell and work than people like me and other normal people who was sensible and did not go in when sick, took advantage of sick days offereed and did not kill myself on rotations-that way I had the energy to honor my shelfs, to have a great life outside work and be happy most improtantly. I can already tell most of you bums are miserable

 

[dpmd]

I don't know if I should feel sad for the people whose medical schools allow their students to train at hospitals where their efforts are useless. I know I would have hated if my notes were ignored, my team excluded me from the decision making process, and I couldn't evaluate patients on my own in clinic. On the other hand, some people seem to like it that they are worthless and therefore don't need to come in. Whatever floats your boat I guess.

 

[SLUser11]

I don't know if I should feel sad for the people whose medical schools allow their students to train at hospitals where their efforts are useless. I know I would have hated if my notes were ignored, my team excluded me from the decision making process, and I couldn't evaluate patients on my own in clinic. On the other hand, some people seem to like it that they are worthless and therefore don't need to come in. Whatever floats your boat I guess.

That's the great thing about people like Anal-eyes this: They think they have it all figured out and are just "too smart" to try hard, etc. therefore justifying their bad work ethic.

The whole "when it matters, I'll try hard" line is bullcrap as well because I've seen plenty of med students with the aforementioned attitude, and I've seldom seen any significant change in their attitude as residents. Like I said before, it's arrogant, selfish, self-serving, etc.

While this isn't the first time I've seen it, I still laugh at the irony of someone going into psychiatry having such poor insight.

 

[mig26x]

I remember missing one week of my IM 4th year rotation. One night after getting home from the hospital i had 4 episodes of hematemesis with one very serious vaso-vagal episode. After an endoscopy they found I had 3 gastric ulcers that were the results of taking Ibuprofen pills!!! My Hemoglobin was 10.3 (male) and I feel weak as hell and got dizzy when walking

The next day i call my intern and let her know i was gonna be absent and I call the attending too. When I got back to the hospital one week later (GI doctor orders) the attending didnt believe me even though i had laboratories results, endocoscopy pictures and a letter from my GI doctor explaining the episode.

Can you guys believe he gave me a C in the evaluations. He told me that he can walk around fairly easily if he's Hemoglobin was 10.4.

I wanted to kill him!!!

We are human beings and we get sick like anyother person in this world, I dont know why some doctors are such a pain in the a$$.

 

[fang]

1. I can't help but assume that most of the posters saying it's perfectly ok to call in sick are women. Am I wrong? I think it's because I 1) think it's weak to call in sick, and 2) think women are weaker than men. Hopefully I'm wrong......
.

This is absolutely wrong. Haven't you been around on the wards long enough to figure this out? In the area of responding to illness, women are definitely not the weaker sex.

I'm female, and whether through hygeine or immunity I almost never get sick-(I was ill once during 3rd year, and it wasn't a big deal). I completely agree that vomiting and diarrhea are good reasons NOT to come in, and if that happens to me I'll stay home. However, it's maddening to see people take "sick days" when they're just worn out.

There was a student in my rotation group who would pull this a lot-- she's just out of college, lives with her parents (she's Asian though, which I guess isn't too unusual), dating her Jr. high school boyfriend, weighs about 80 lbs, and just about died during OB-GYN. Every block, she'd come down with something about midway through week 4 and stay home for a few days. I don't think she was inventing anything, but I think she's just one of those people who can't work unusual hours without physical consequences. She's smart and pleasant, is one of the top students in the class, and wants to go to a really competative residency program. I think she'll be a great resident, but she's probably going to take a lot of days off.