At the end of the day, you have to do what you feel is right and most of the time things always work out. You can have 100 docs make the same decision and 1/3 happy, 1/3 unhappy, 1/3 ok with the decision regardless of what you are switching out of/into.
I am a logical person and unless I was completely sure about this decisions, putting another 2-3 yrs of residency would really suck when your friends are out working 15 dys a month, taking nice vacations, making 300+K/yr while you are getting off you 24 hr call.
But devils advocate
Things I dislike about emergency medicine:
The shift-work mentality does not build professional respect - Makes no sense. Many fields do shift work. OB hospitalist, IM hospitalists, Trauma surgeons, Some radiologists. If shift work mentality is such a big deal, come to my shop and you can have all of the nights
Most of your working hours are during afternoons, evenings, weekends
holidays, etc. (I used to be away from home 16-18 nights/month) - You do work non banker hours, I will admit.
Spent alot of time talking to people on the phone - I do not talk on the phone as much as many other specialists. Look at how many calls the radiologists have to make. I do not call patients. I call specialists probably 4-6 times a shift. I texts all of my admissions.
Spent alot of time waiting for other people to do things (consults,
returns pages, admit pt, etc.) - You think Anesthesia is any better? Do you think a surgery happens when you say it should? You gotta wait on the surgeon, the cases before you, the nurses, etc.
Most of time is spent seeing stuff that could/should be seen in clinic - I like to see clinic stuff mixed in with sick pts. How would you like to run 4 rooms of all obese, diabetic, 90 yr old cardiac patients? Just like me, I like some easy money.
Rarely see a critically ill patient (the type of case that draws people to
the specialty) - Really? I would completely disagree with this.
Production pressure ("move the meat") - This is true, but you think other hospital based fields do not have the same issues? Ask your radiologist, anesthesiologist, hospitals friends about their metrics.
As an EP you are not a "specialist" in any discipline of medicine,
despite what you may think - I do not even want to debate this.
The nature of the work is stressfull. The multi-tasking is comparable
to being an air-traffic controller or bonds trader - I prefer to deal with a bunch of patients rather than running around 4 rooms while a CRNA runs the cases.
I rarely did procedures, despite being at one of the busiest ER's in the
country (>110,000 visits a year) - Procedures are great but IMO, overrated. After the 100's central line, 30 chest tubes, 1000 sutures, etc.... I can live without doing these again. For some reason I have never seen an anesthesiologists happy when I call them for a central line or blood patch.
Things I like about Anesthesis:
You get to be an expert in a specialty - ok
You get to see an effect from your actions (pharmacology,
physiology, critical care in action) - I guess so
Better hours (Quality not Quantity) - I would rather work my 35 hrs a week, get 15 dys off a month than wake up at 6am work til 4pm with call on top of that. Again debatable but to each its own.
More procedures - You will learn after about 3 yrs of working that IVs, central lines, intubations, blood patches, Epidurals are not much fun.
Better interactions with patients and physicians - I completely disagree with this.